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The scene is disconcerting, even revolting. It takes place on May 29, at the convention center in Houston, Texas, during the ” prayer breakfast of the National Rifle Association, the most powerful pro-gun lobby in the United States. It is filmed by Shane Claiborne, pastor and anti-gun activist. In front of hundreds of participants in ties seated in front of a breakfast, a man takes the floor by inviting everyone to recite the oath of allegiance and… the prayer of Saint Francis of Assisi, “ Where there is hatred, let me sow love (…). Make me an instrument of your peace “.

The National Rifle Association, a shooting club for Civil War veterans that has become the most powerful pro-gun lobby in the United States, is regularly blamed for the circulation of firearms – and therefore for the high occurrence of mass shootings. ” Between 2009 and 2018, the United States experienced 57 times more school shootings than all major industrialized countries combined “, recorded, in May 2018, the CNN channel.

In 2022 alone, as of this writing, 288 mass shootings (an average of 54 per month) took place on US soil, leaving 337 dead and 1,194 injured. According to Stanford University, a mass shooting is when three or more people have been shot at, excluding the perpetrator, in one place and at the same time. Shootings linked to organized crime and settling scores are excluded from this grim tally.

The bearing of arms, a divine right

While the majority of Americans favor gun control measures, the NRA continues to defend the Second Amendment to the US Constitution as a “divine right”…as do most pro-gun Americans. Sociologist specializing in religions, Jessica Dawson is the author of the article ” This Must Not Be Infringed: How the NRA Uses Religious Language to Transform the Meaning of the Second Amendment », published in the prestigious scientific journal Nature. The researcher dissects the use of religious vocabulary in the discourse of the NRA, which has become more and more dense in recent years. The result of a change in policy that took place some twenty years ago.

In 1999, two gunmen killed 12 students and a high school teacher in Columbine, Colorado. What was at the time the deadliest school shooting in US history sent shock waves through public opinion. The NRA, whose goal is to defend the carrying of weapons in the United States, changes its strategy. The fight is no longer legislative or political: it is moral. “ That’s when they started using the word “evil” in their speechanalyzes Jessica Dawson. They claimed – and they weren’t wrong! – that we were facing a fight against evil, against the monsters in our streets… But that the only way to stop evil was through the use of violence. »

“A good guy with a gun”

Spurred on by NRA chairmen like Charlton Heston – Hollywood star actor turned pro-gun activist – the speech God & Country (“God and the nation”) is set up. The battle for the bearing of arms becomes a moral combat, a holy war. A theory illustrated by the famous quote from Wayne LaPierre, executive vice president of the NRA, who in 2012, after the bloody shooting at the Sandy Hook school, declared: “ The only thing that can stop a mean guy (bad guy) with a gun, he’s a good guy (nice guy) with a weapon. »

“ For them, the problem is not the bearing of arms, but the sin in the heart of man that drives him to commit these horrible acts. explains Andrew Whitehead. This sociologist of religions and professor at the University of Indiana is the co-author of a study published in the washington post in 2019 and which is called ” Why Some Christians Don’t Believe in Gun Controls: They Think God Gave Them the Second Amendment “. In this study, he develops the thesis that Americans who identify as Christian nationalists – an ideology according to which the American nation is defined through Christianity – would be more inclined to support the carrying of weapons.

The myth of the American nation

The Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which specifies that ” a well-organized militia being necessary for the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms must not be infringed is indeed one of the cornerstones of this mythological version of the history of the American nation. “ According to them, the Constitution, written by the Founding Fathers, was inspired by Goddetails Andrew Whitehead. Thus, any attempt to control the carrying of weapons is perceived as an attack on God, and a fortiori against Christians. The right to own weapons is intimately linked to the perception they have of themselves as Christians and Americans. »

From this Christian nationalism stems the idea that the United States, compared to the Promised Land of the Hebrews, would have been chosen by God to bring peace, Christianity and democracy to the rest of the world. ” And carrying guns is part of that story “, adds Philip Gorski, sociologist of religions at the prestigious Yale University and co-author of the book The Flag and The Cross (Oxford University Press Inc, 2022).

The firearm symbol in the United States has evolved over the course of nation building. Until the end of the 19th-beginning of the 20th century, weapons were simply a defense tool for farmers against thieves and stray animals. But the arrival of the railroad in rural regions, the ensuing exodus to the cities, the fear of a Christianity that had become “too feminine” and the period of post-Civil War reconstruction, which saw the emancipation of former slaves, crystallize concerns about the supposedly threatened future of the rural, proud, white man, protecting his family from the horrors of urban life.

“Protection against liberal, LGBT, atheist and pro-non-white immigration tyranny”

In the 1960s and 1970s, as the government implemented anti-segregationist laws in favor of minorities in the United States, armed and anti-government militias organized themselves to “defend the true American identity”, supposedly white, Christian and nationalist. ” The election of Obama, a Democratic and black president in the midst of an economic crisis, has awakened this movement of white anti-government militiasanalyzes Jessica Dawson. The NRA developed this rhetoric of being beleaguered by developing spiritual vocabulary. »

Over the years, arms manufacturers have accompanied this ideological and virilistic shift by incorporating religious elements into their marketing. The Texas-based American arms manufacturer Crusader in 2015 marketed an AR-15 assault rifle (the weapon most often used in mass killings) marked with a cross inside a shield, similar to that used by the Templars during the Crusades, and adorned with a verse from Psalm 144: “Blessed be the Lord, my rock! He trains my hands for combat, he trains me for battle. Other manufacturers have also used the phrase written by Saint Paul in his epistle to the Ephesians: “Draw your energy from the Lord and from the vigor of his strength.” Put on God-given battle gear, so you can stand against the devil’s machinations. »

Today, the creed of nationalist Christians boils down to the 4Fs: faith, freedom, family, firearms (“faith, freedom, family, guns”). ” These Americans’ Attachment to Guns is Often Driven by Fearanalyzes Philip Gorski. Fear of a strong cultural change, gender and sexuality issues, the great replacement… Guns have become the manly symbol of a tool of defense against supposed liberal, LGBT, atheist, non-white pro-immigration tyranny “, specifies the researcher.

Without any biblical foundation, this nationalist Christian movement is sometimes tinged with Pelagianism, a doctrine, opposed by Saint Augustine, according to which everyone is responsible for his own salvation. Add to that a pinch of myth of the self-made man American style and an ounce of Calvinist thought. ” The idea of ​​personal moral responsibility is widespread among conservative American Protestantsinsists Philip Gorski. Everyone is responsible for their own destiny, and success in business is a reflection of God’s blessings. » Thus, pro-arms Christians tend to be pro-life, but also in favor of the death penalty and against the establishment of universal Social Security… in contrast even more with the doctrine of the Catholic Church in favor of the protection of life in all its forms.

However, if we tend to associate American nationalist Christians with the cliché of the southern evangelical Protestant in cowboy boots, the study by Andrew Whitehead and his colleagues published in The Washington Post undermines this stereotype. ” Opposition to gun control reforms breaks through denominational differencessays the study. It does not matter whether one is Evangelical, Reformed or Catholic, the influence of Christian nationalism is not attached to a religious tradition. » And who cares if Pope Francis rails against firearms in the aftermath of the Uvalde massacre, or the Archbishop of Chicago, Cardinal Cupich, denounces the visceral attachment to the Second Amendment. It’s no secret: it’s been a long time since a good part of American Catholics, much more conservative than Francis, no longer attend the Pope’s Angelus on Sunday noon.