Christian Identity Movement
CHRISTIAN IDENTITY MOVEMENT is an offshoot of Protestantism found mostly in the United States and other English-speaking countries. The movement is characterized by an anti-Semitic and racist theology. Once the dominant religious orientation on the extreme right in the United States, Christian Identity now appears to be in decline.
History
Christian Identity developed out of British-Israelism (also known as Anglo-Israelism). British-Israelism emerged in Great Britain during the second half of the nineteenth century. It was neither a church nor a sect but rather an interpretive tendency among Protestants, largely members of the Church of England. Its distinctiveness rested upon its revisionist approach to sacred history. According to Anglo-Israelites, the British Isles had been populated by the Lost Tribes of Israel, who had wandered west from their original place of exile in the Middle East. In many versions of British-Israelism, the tribes were also said to have populated much of northwest Europe. British-Israelites, active at the summit of empire, saw British imperialism as both a divine mission and a demonstration of God's favor.
British-Israelism quickly spread to the United States, where it fitted well with conceptions of manifest destiny. Indeed, as the power of the United States increased, American Anglo-Israelites began to suggest that the country might be the inheritor of Britain's divine role.
This page contains 201 words.
Christian Identity Movement article
Read the rest of this article.
This article contains 2,026 words
(approx. 7 pages at 300 words per page).
Order our Christian Identity Article
