Survival and Resistance in Evangelical America: Christian Reconstruction in the Pacific Northwest

by Crawford Gribben

Over the last thirty years, conservative evangelicals have been moving to the Northwest of the United States, where they hope to resist the impact of secular modernity and to survive the breakdown of society that they anticipate. These believers have often given up on the politics of the Christian Right, adopting strategies of hibernation while developing the communities and institutions from which a new America might one day emerge. Their activity coincides with the promotion by prominent survivalist authors of a program of migration to the "American Redoubt," a region encompassing Idaho, Montana, parts of eastern Washington and Oregon, and Wyoming, as a haven in which to endure hostile social change or natural disaster and in which to build a new social order. These migration movements have independent origins, but they overlap in their influences and aspirations, working in tandem to offer a vision of the present in which Christian values must be defended as American society is rebuilt according to biblical law. This book examines the origins, evolution, and cultural reach of this little-noted migration and considers what it might tell us about the future of American evangelicalism.Drawing on Calvinist theology, the social theory of Christian Reconstruction, and libertarian politics, these believers are projecting significant soft power. Their books are promoted by leading mainstream publishers and listed as New York Times bestsellers. Their strategy is gaining momentum, making an impact in local political and economic life, while being repackaged for a wider audience in publications by a broader coalition of conservative commentators and in American mass culture. This survivalist evangelical subculture recognizes that they have lost the culture war - but another kind of conflict is beginning.

Genres: History, Politics, Cultural, Christian, Religion, Christianity, Nonfiction

224 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 1, 2021

About the author

A cultural and literary historian whose work concentrates on the development and dissemination of religious ideas, Crawford Gribben is Professor of History at Queen's University, Belfast.

Reviews

[Valerie Horner · Rating 4 out of 5]

As an evangelical who lives in the Northwest, attends a CRE church, and has published an article on James Rawles website Survival Blog, I of course had to read Survival and Resistance in Evangelical America since Doug Wilson, founder of the CREC, and James Rawles are Gribben’s main subjects. I was pleased to find that the book was both fair and extremely well researched. Unlike the misleading blurb on the back of this book by Phillip Jenkins, Gribben goes out of his way to show that the great majority of those living in the “redoubt” (Eastern WA and Oregon, Idaho, Montana, and Wyoming) are are neither racist or violent. (Although they certainly believe in self defense.) Gribbens quotes extensively from Rushdoony, Gary North, and Douglas Wilson to let them explain their views on Christian Reconstruction or Theonomy. Theonomy means God’s Law which is a term that could apply to just the first five books of the Bible or the whole Bible - Old and New Testament. The term Theonomy sends such chills down the backs of progressive that it makes them run off and write hysterical books and TV shows like The Handmaid’s Tale that project some dystopic Iranian style Sharia Government unto a future Chrisitan America.

It would be nice if people had a little better understanding that Biblical Law has been deeply woven into the fabric of Western Civilization for 1500 years. King Alfred the Great wrote the English Law Code to include excerpts from the Ten Commandments, passages of the Book of Exodus, Christ’s Sermon on the Mount, and the Acts of the Apostles. The foundation of The Magna Carta, English Common Law, and American Law are all firmly Biblical. The Bible is regularly quoted in criminal sentencing. The state, federal, and Supreme court have often cited the The Torah. The courts often use the Bible to explain the historical background of a law. According to recent Pew Research
about half of Americans say the Bible should have at least “some” influence on U.S. laws and 23% who say it should have “a great deal” of influence

In other words the philosophy that gave us our Bill of Rights is Theonomic. As Rushdooney, the father of the movement called Reconstructionism stated "Few things are more commonly misunderstood than the nature & meaning of theocracy. It is commonly assumed to be a dictatorial rule by self-appointed men who claim to rule for God. In reality, theocracy in Biblical law is the closest thing to radical libertarianism."

That Rushdoony has influenced many Christian leaders, the home schooling movement, and some conservative political trends is certainly true. However, Rushdoony is not the architect or the pope who’s word is considered infallible. Reconstructionists are not calling for an Ecclesiocracy (a government run by a church or particular denomination like was often the case in the Middle Ages.) In fact most of us heartily approve of the separation of church and state and have no desire, for example, to see prayer required in the public schools. We prefer to see the federal government get out of the public school system and perhaps have a mix of state or community run, business run, and church run schools. (The other side of this separation coin is that the Government has no right to tell the churches how they should be run, who they should hire, when to be open or closed, etcetera.)

Gribben’s chapter on eschatology is well informed and useful for those who wish to understand the complex interplay of different Christian philosophies and their impact on culture and politics. He points out that econstructionists are intent on building their own Christian culture through the arts, education, small business ownership that hopefully will grow and influence the greater culture at large. They are not revolutionaries.

Gribbens is concerned that a theonomic influence upon government does not work well with pluralism. Reconstructionists argue that there is no such thing as neutrality in government or education. Pluralism is a pretty and friendly sort of girl who likes to play the field, but we all know sooner or later she is going to want to settle down. The question is with whom will she marry and have babies? The dark and handsome man who hides Sharia in his heart? The anarchist who just want to burn it all down while getting high? The cool socialist who has undercover connections to the CPC, or his brother the technocrat who desires a tightly controlled, surveilled, and centralized society where you “own nothing but are happy”? Or perhaps she’ll stay with the Theonomist next door who clings to his God, guns, and freedoms. She better pick soon, or she might get kidnapped by one of the above and lose her right to choose. There is no true neutrality in government. Every government has a God.

[Ashley Glassick · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really enjoyed this book, though because of it being rather more academic than I’m used to I had some starts and stops.

Full disclosure: I already had a negative perception of this topic before reading the book. Because of this, I was impressed by the author’s ability to maintain an academic tone throughout. This lent to the book being dry and repetitive at times but I much prefer that to a book that is calling itself academic but is so obviously biased in tone (*cough* J&JW).

A couple of things I learned and thoughts I had while reading:

1)All roads lead to (or from?) Rushdooney. I learned about him as a historical figure and how he figures into this modern movement, even threads in my own denomination.
2)This movement impacts everything in the PNW and Idaho area or “Redoubt” as the author call it.
3)The chapter on education was worth the price of admission. How this is all connected to the neo-classical education movement is interesting. Particularly, the branding surrounding Moscow and their publishing house/school etc.
4)Reading about the development of anti-government and libertarian ideas helped me understand the powder keg that was the conservative response to COVID. All of these ideas were bubbling below the surface.

Overall, this is a helpful book that I think someone who supports this movement could read and find helpful, though I walked still disliking the movement as a whole, albeit with slightly more nuanced opinions.

[Samuel G. Parkison · Rating 4 out of 5]

In Survival and Resistance in Evangelical America: Christian Reconstruction in the Pacific Northwest (Oxford University Press, 2020), Crawford Gribben provides an exposé on American Evangelicalism's black sheep. Neither a hit piece nor a puff piece, Gribben is judicial and cool-headed in his description of the Reconstruction movement. In particular, he shows the continuities and discontinuities between the movement started by R. J. Rushdoony and Gary North and the community in Moscow, ID, centered around Christ Church and Canon Press. There is much to appreciate about this work. I agree with Gribben that it would be right to identify Moscow as the beginnings of a ground-level manifestation of what Rushdoony describes, even if Wilson has not a few stark differences Rushdoony. I also appreciated the fact that Gribben, even while not shying away from the strange associations between unsavory groups like the "kinists," or the paranoid novels of James Wesley Rawless, and the ministry of Doug Wilson, he allowed for all these parties to speak for themselves. The external associations are enough for some people to write Wilson off as a "racist," but Gribben brings Wilson's own biting criticisms of these other groups to the surface.

The last major strength of Gribben's work that I'll mention is his penetrating insights into what makes this movement tick. His work disallows the lazy thinking that all-too-often dismisses this rowdy extension of the evangelical family. Often, critics will identify bad optics of correlations as necessary causation. E.g., "The uber-woke anti-racists really hate Doug Wilson, and kinists, despite being repudiated by Wilson at every opportunity he gets, keep attaching themselves to him. He's constantly being called a racist, therefore, his theological positions must lead to racism" or "Paul Jennings Hill was a theonomist and he was sent to death row for murdering an abortionist, therefore theonomy must radicalize its followers to become murderers." Gribben, however, understands the ideas themselves, and his presentation, which is by no means an endorsement, won't allow this kind of sophistry. He writes, "The intellectual tradition that this book has been describing also contains the tools by which this revolutionary impulse may be contained--and even eradicated.... In other words, one of the most effective ways of controlling what critics may describe as a propensity for violence within the cultures of Christian Reconstruction and the evangelical far-right may be to encourage the adherents of these idea-sets to pursue a closer reading of some of their key foundational texts" (pg. 142).

While Gribben is fairly conservative about making pronouncements on what has made Moscow successful, while earlier iterations of Reconstruction have died out, I think the answer is implicitly within the pages of this book. I believe I can be summarized in three points. First, Wilson and the community of Moscow, unlike Rushdoony and Bahnsen, does not put the theonomic cart before the postmillennial horse. The Reconstructin debates of the 1960s and 70s seem to me to focus too morbidly on the particulars of theonomic reconstruction, which are irrelevant in the abstract. Frankly, they fought tooth and nail (even with each other, at times) about the particulars of civil laws that, even within a postmillennial context, wouldn't become relevant until a massive segment of the society was successfully evangelized. It is true that Rushdoony's envisioned Reconstruction was always intended to be a bottom-up transformation of society, wrought through the leaven-spreading work of evangelism, but practically, their debates were all about what that society must look like by the time that work was done. Regardless of whether he is right in his theological convictions, and regardless of whether this sequence plays out for every proponent of theonomy and/or postmillennialism, Wilson at least recognizes that convincing the Christian world of postmillennialism is a more pressing concern than convincing it of theonomy. One may become convinced of theonomy with no practical ramifications coming of it beyond the stimulating conversation here or there. Besides, this newfound conviction may be encouraging (if the person is also an eschatological optimist) but it might also merely serve to increase anxiety and turn the person into an alarmist (if the person is also an eschatological pessimist). But if one becomes a postmillennialist, some form of theonomy follows necessarily, even while it doesn't require all the particulars to be worked out.

Second, and related, Wilson and the community in Moscow is not marked by a curmudgeonly fear of culture, nor is it reactionary. The contrast can be demonstrated in the juxtaposition of a late-1990s Gary North writing alarmist articles about Y2K and the need to stock up and prepare for societal devastation, while a late-1990s Doug Wilson writes satirical articles mocking him. While Rushdoony and North fretted over the dissolution of culture, Wilson and his friends began building a new one, and in 2021 the harvest of what they were planting in 1995 is undeniably impressive. This point is manifested most strikingly in the temperamental mood of the two respective tribes. The whimsical jolly-ness of Moscow contrasts sharply with the furrowed brows of Rushdoony.

Third, Rushdoony made the fateful mistake of denigrating much of the Great Tradition--pagan and Christian alike—while Wilson, and the Classical Christian Education movement he helped start—did the exact opposite. This, I think, is the single greatest reason why Canon Press and the whole community in Moscow has been such a success: they love the great books of the great tradition. New Saint Andrews is old enough now to begin seeing returns on the investments it made on its students by feeding them with a steady diet of Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas, Boethius, Athanasius, Anselm, Augustine, Luther, Homer, Virgil, Date, Chaucer, Calvin, Bunyan, Defoe, Austen, Dickens, Dostoevsky, Faulkner, Chesterton, and—of course—Lewis. The results are outstanding, and they serve all on their own as an apologetic answer to Rushdoony's "horror" over the revival of classical education. In despising this great tradition, Rushdoony was depriving his own movement of the soil it needed to survive. The Moscow community, by rooting itself firmly in the Great Tradition, has secured its future relevance in ways that the Biblicist wheel-reinventing strategy of the earlier Reconstructionists prohibited. This is really the reason for the last major contribution Gribben recognizes: their impressive media output. A fearless appreciation for Western civilization’s greatest works will inevitably lead to producing great works.

In the main, the big evangelical world seems to me to despise these folks so much they are trying to wish them away by pretending like they don't exist. When they do mention this "black sheep" family of the evangelical world, they are so vicious their overreaction backfires (For example, I was tickled to discover that Rod Dreher decided not to include Christ Church and the community in Moscow in his Benedict Option over a scandal. When first reading The Benedict Option, I was struck by how conspicuous the absence felt. In light of how relevant their project is to the contents of the Benedict Option, their absence spoke more loudly than a brief section--or even a footnote--would have been). This strategy of many big Christian outlets to either dunk as hard as they possibly can on these folks, or else ignore them out of existence is short-sighted. Whether you agree with them or not, their influence is too formidable for responsible Christian cultural analysts to not reckon with honestly.

I'm reminded of something G.K. Chesterton says about Christianity. "Now the best relation to our spiritual home is to be near enough to love it. But the next best thing is to be far enough away not to hate it... The worst judge of all is the man now most ready with his judgments; the ill-educated Christian turning gradually into the ill-tempered agnostic, entangled in the end of a feud of which he never understood the beginning, blighted with a sort of hereditary boredom with which he knows not what, and already weary of hearing what he has never heard" (Chesterton, The Everlasting Man, Introduction). I'm not sold on theonomy, and I'm not a postmillennialist, so while I'm not close enough to "love it"—to use Chesterton's language, I'm at least close enough to "like it." What Chesterton says about Christianity I repeat about these Reconstructionists: the worst judges are those most ready to share their opinions, they are ill-educated and ill-tempered Reformed types who can't see past their own cloudy steam of boiling contempt for these people. I may not be convinced of the theological motives, nor their ultimate societal goal, but I certainly agree with their immediate call to action (i.e., make disciples of all the nations). I can and should agree with the overarching project of what they do, regardless of how they do it. But between you and me, I love their style.

[Shea Stacy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting historical survey of a movement. I'm fascinated by what was going on in American Christianity during my parents lifetime and leading up to my birth. The title really does explain the book well. Major figures examined include RJ Rushdoony, Gary North, John Wesley Rawles, and Douglas Wilson.

Many things the recons were doing and talking about I find incredibly compelling and would have loved to meet them and learn directly from someone like Rushdoony. Also lots of things that confuse me, such as the Y2K thing.
This book continues to strengthen my admiration for the Moscow Project and Douglas Wilson. They have succeeded where many have failed, and in something that it might be too late for many Christians to build strongholds for what might come.

Gribbon is a compelling writer and treats those he is writing about in a fair and even handed way. Strongly recommend if the title interests you at all.

[Eddie Mercado · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very good piece of scholarship. Demonstrating an ability to give a nuanced look to a group of Christian Reconstructionists in the PNW, Gribben provides a fine overview of the influences behind this modern Reconstruction movement, as well as how it has developed to reach places outside of this relatively small region. I think the key chapters are on eschatology and media. Wilson et al are motivated to “Christianize” their town because of their Postmillennial eschatology. The key figures in this movement are not primarily seeking to be political figures, but are promoting a theological vision that (they believe) is holistic. When analyzing this vision, Gribben provides some great insights, such as when he notes the connection between Theonomy and Libertarianism (two strange bed-fellows given the amount of oversight theonomy would require). Near the end of the book, Gribben also makes the fantastic point that “evangelicals… mimic as much as they criticize [the] cultural mainstream… tuning in to a Zeitgeist in their practice of survival, resistance, and reconstruction.”

This book is not a hit piece. It gives an informed analysis of the roots of Reconstructionism, while subtly providing modest critique as food for thought. The amount of sympathy with this movement in Reformed circles continues to be an enigma in my opinion. This book won’t change anyone’s mind on the validity (or lack thereof) of this movement, but Gribben does a great job placing it in its historical context.

For a robust theological critique of this movement, the writings of Richard Gaffin and Vern Poythress on Theonomy are biblically and confessionally sound.

[Paul · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is an odd and ultimately unsatisfying exploration of Christian extremism in Idaho. I don't want to belabor my objections or turn this review into a gripe-fest; I did learn a lot from reading this book, but among its significant flaws:

• Essentially no women quoted or cited in the entire book.
• A shocking refusal to engage, or even forthrightly mention, serious allegations of abuse within the congregation that is the primary focus of the book.
• A failure to provide context regarding the actual size or importance of the movements he's describing.
• Major digressions into barely relevant subjects such as the history of Christian pop culture.
• An overall feeling that he's too close to his subjects and doesn't want to offend them by describing them or their movement in ways they would find objectionable.

This last point might not be fair, but it's the impression I get; Gribben takes at face value his subjects' rejection of racism, for example, but it's not clear that a bunch of White people fleeing urban areas for monochromatic rural environments can so easily shake that stigma, especially given that area's notoriety for being the home of numerous White supremacist groups, including the Aryan Nation.

Overall, this was very disappointing – a promising topic and an interesting approach, but overall not a good result.

[Wyatt Graham · Rating 5 out of 5]

Full reviewing forthcoming. OUP sent this for me to review, which I will do so fully at wyattgraham.com. But here, I will note that Gribben has written a brilliant analysis that illuminates so much of contemporary evangelical culture.

[Andrew · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are trying to pin down the Moscow movement and just stepping into the conversation, this book provides a great historical background on how we arrived at this moment.

Well written and fairly unbiased, Gribben provides a much needed account for pastors today. Until recently, when a new doctrine would arrise, it would be concentrated to a geographical area. The advent of media sources has changed this, and so it has become more difficult for pastors to warn congregants regarding wolves. The wolves no longer need to be physically present, they can influence through social media, books, movies, etc. Pastors need to become more well-rounded today than ever before due to this. This media approach is used heavily by the Moscow crew, and it is attracting attention nationally.

This book provides a good introduction to the cultural movement. As difficult as it is to describe a culture, Gribben gets Moscow pretty close.

[Bradley Plausse · Rating 3 out of 5]

While reading the history of Canon Press, I played a little game of “spot the last name of the employee that rubbed me the wrong way when I worked there.” I remember thinking to myself “who made you king?” when really I should’ve asked “Who’s your daddy?”

Like the other book I read by this author, I felt that the topic was very interesting but the organization left a lot to be desired. Chapters are titled very broadly - “media,” “history” - and I wish the author broke it up into shorter, more focused chapters.

[Zach Hollifield · Rating 5 out of 5]

A biography of a movement and region. Evenhanded and incredibly informative.

Required reading for making sense of Wilson, Moscow, the likes, and their postmil/reconstructionist project(s).

[Charles Williams · Rating 4 out of 5]

Helpfully contextualizes, not simply the history, but the highly multifaceted culture of the Christian Reconstruction (CR) movement, be it in the likes of Rushdoony, North, Rawles or Wilson, while focusing particularly on its development in the Pacific Northwest. Neither apologetic nor hyper-critical, Gribben seeks to explain the complexities of CR in 'the American Redoubt', in light of its anxieties and goals, from the 'evangelical' presidencies of Carter, Ford, Bush 1 & 2, and Clinton, to a post-evangelical political culture under the Obama and Trump administrations. Rather than follow the 'top-down' revolutionary program of broader evangelicalism, CR has sought rather a different policy, from the 'bottom-up': one of "survival, resistance, and reconstruction", albeit through various, even contradictory, ideologies and programs among its leadership. Though these varying forms of resistance feed upon a particular culture of paranoia, Gribbens argues that CR offers revolutionary, albeit non-violent, long-term strategies for helping reconstruct local communities in the face of threats - be they perceived or real - to American liberties.

This book cogently describes a subset of the Christian Right that defies cultural stereotypes of the Twitterati. Unlike the broader evangelical right, many within the CR movement do not intend to reclaim the political landscape; yet on the other hand, despite their paranoid demeanor and migratory posturing to the American Redoubt, none of those interviewed by Gribben's book have articulated any form of violent overthrow of the government itself. Troubled as one may be by some of the basic tenants of CR (and they are troubling), Gribben does not resort to scare tactics by accusing CR as a resilient form of fascism (as some have done). Rather, he simply describes the social preconditions that have shaped one of the ways in which evangelicalism and Reformed Protestantism are seeking to survive the crisis of American modernity and the culture wars of the West. If anything, Gribben helps show how varied conservative American evangelicalism really is.

[ValeReads Kyriosity · Rating 3 out of 5]

I recognized our church community in some of what he said about us, but not in all. I hardly ever hear the word "reconstructionist" around here, yet Gribben insists on labeling us as such. Someone from afar might think I had dandruff with all the head-scratching I did over this. One story I heard is that when Gribben first sat down with some of the Moscow leaders, he mentioned another organization he discusses in the book and was met with blank stares. Our guys had never heard of 'em (though they were obviously familiar with us). Gribben's thesis seems to require some sort of intentionality about these and other groups all being in the PNW together, but Christ Church and our related ministries are here for completely different reasons. He even mentions a bit about why Jim Wilson (whom nobody could possibly imagine was a recon guy) chose Moscow, which pretty much makes our continued presence here accidental and, in relation to the other groups, coincidental. I have no complaints about how Gribben portrayed us — this was no hit piece, and goodness knows we've seen enough of those to know what one looks like — I just question whether his thesis holds up.

The book is already a little dated. So much has happened in the past few years. We've had a population explosion, for one thing, which Gribben might take as confirmation of his thesis, but it's not like we were actively recruiting. God just keeps sending us more people. But other Christian communities (I'm thinking particularly of Ogden and Batavia) have also boomed in the past few years. They're younger than Moscow, but we feel much more kindred-spiritedness with them than with, e.g., the Redoubt survivalists. I think Gribben tries to make causation out of correlation, and I don't think he pulls it off.

A lot of the background history he gave was interesting, though.

The narrator was OK as narrators go, but I sure wish someone had told him how to pronounce Moscow. Seven hours of hearing it wrong was a trial to my soul. 😉

[Jake McAtee]

"“And so, by the mid-1990s, Molly Worthen has argued, Reconstructionism “trailed off.”20 Michael McVicar announced its death.21 But the argument of this book is that Christian Reconstruction is not dead anymore. Paradoxically, the failure of the first generation of theonomists to cohere, either personally or ideo- logically, has worked in the movement’s favor, creating an internal market- place of ideas by means of which competing groupings within political and religious conservatism have been able to appropriate and adopt their central arguments.22 “Christian Reconstructionist thought,” Worthen observes, “has tempered itself for popular appeal,” as the cultural work of the Moscow community and Redoubt advocates indicates, and its achievements have been subtler and more effective than many of its critics have seen.23 The success of the Moscow theonomists has been so effective in reprofiling their ideology as to have it situated within the American mass market: Douglas Wilson’s Man Rampant (2019–), is now a product that may be consumed on Amazon Prime video. Mass culture routinizes what was once regarded as radical, with effects that may not easily be predicted at the “end of white, Christian America.”

[Han · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dr. R. Scott Clark told me if I haven’t read this book that I had to because it is essential reading on this topic. So, I immediately took his advice and read it in a few short days.

I was not disappointed!

The author tends to repeat himself, but not without warrant. It was well researched, balanced, and objective. I found it to be very educational without being dull or overly cerebral.

I was not alive during many of the years the author covers, so my knowledge about what happened during that time period was limited. The author did well to catch me up to speed, and even at times when I felt a little lost he would come around full circle to help clarify his intentions.

[C Dumaoal · Rating 4 out of 5]

4.5 rounded down - I am on a quest to read all scholarly literature about Doug Wilson. This is an easy quest because so little exists. The chapter on education was my favorite (duh). This guy does not entirely understand what’s going on with race in Wilson’s project but I think that might have more to do with a lack of understanding of what’s going on with race in America in general. Very weird, out-of-nowhere MacIntyre pull at the end. Not the choice I would’ve made lol. Very good overall though.

[Eva · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating and well researched insight to the reconstruction and post millennial movement in the PNW.

Showing the role of this movement in relation to the home education and private Christian education system which is now widely accepted in US was a highlight of this study for me.

Gribben as a Professor at Queen's University Belfast made insightful comparisons to Northern Ireland in the concluding chapter.

I believe this is a fair assessment of the movement and those within it have been extensively quoted to describe their beliefs in their own words however there was no engagement with recent pastoral controversy.

[Mike Conroy · Rating 3 out of 5]

If you are looking for a brief, recent historical sketch of the movement in Moscow, then this is your book. This book connect certain people/key-leaders of this movement together, which was helpful to me. I thought the subjects he covered were important to understanding the movement. I would have liked more analysis, as this book had none.

[Joel Carlson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Really enjoyed this book. Being born and raised in the Redoubt, and now pastoring a church here, much of what was described resonated accurately with how I perceive this part of the US. This book brought clarity and voice to an often misunderstood segment of Christianity.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

A relatively objective account of Christian Reconstructionism and its impact on America, including a multi-faceted survey of its most well-known offspring, the community of Christ Church in Moscow, ID.

[Ian Clary · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a timely book as we're observing a minor resurgence in Theonomy or Christian Reconstruction in American evangelical circles. Crawford Gribben has traced the influence of early Theonomists like R. J. Rushdoony and Gary North that has taken root in the broader migration of many conservatives and Christians to the American Redoubt (that is, Wyoming, Idaho, and parts of Washington State) as part of a strategy of "survival and resistance." In particular, Gribben focuses his attention on Moscow, Idaho, and the new expression of a kind of Christian Reconstruction in the work of well-known author and pastor, Douglas Wilson. Beyond just Wilson, Gribben looks at related movements for "survival" -- that is, surviving the coming persecution at the hands of a hostile government -- in the Redoubt including the survivalist writings (both blog and novels) of James Wesley Rawles, and the small movement of "kinists," those are not technically white supremacists, but think that the races should not mix (I'm curious as to what they think of Moses being in an interracial marriage). Gribben does a masterful job tracing the rise and importance of the first wave of Reconstruction and carefully examines the influence that they had on these at-time disparate groups. Gribben, who teaches at Queen's University Belfast, is an expert on Christian millennialism, particularly Puritan eschatologies, and the pre-millennialism of the Brethren. This unique expertise adds a richness to his treatment of Reconstructionism's post-millennial eschatology. Alongside this, Gribben looks at the role that migration, resistance to government, Christian education, and the harnessing of various media, play as an explanation of the success that someone like Wilson has in light of the lesser gains of precursors like Rushdoony and North.
As a scholar, Gribben's command of primary and secondary sources is exemplary. He writes in a dispassionate fashion and is not quick to throw anyone under the bus, even if their views are unpalatable to many readers, including Gribben himself (I'm thinking especially of his evenhanded, yet critical treatment of racists and kinists). Gribben spent the summer of 2015 doing fieldwork in the Redoubt and got to know the characters he writes about. This adds a greater depth to his use of scholarly sources.
I know Crawford fairly well and actually supplied some sources for him when he took a trip to Toronto many years ago. Theonomy/Reconstruction has been a long-standing interest for him, and so it's gratifying to see him finally get to publish this excellent book. The personal element goes beyond my friendship with the author and extends to Reconstruction more broadly, and Wilson more specifically. I devoured writings of Reconstructionists like Rushdoony, North, and Greg Bahnsen and I have been a long-time reader of Wilson -- I was first introduced to him through his work on the Christian family. My wife and I read his "Reforming Marriage" on our honeymoon, and found it really helpful. I have also been a regular reader of Wilson's website "Blog and Mablog" (which, curiously, Gribben doesn't mention, though it would fit perfectly in his chapter on media). However, over the past number of years, as Wilson's rhetoric has become less and less charitable, I have all but stopped following him. I did have a memorable opportunity to meet him and his lovely wife Nancy a couple of years ago, in connection with my kids' classical Christian school. "Survival and Resistance in Evangelical America" really helped me put things in place when it comes to how I might appropriate Wilson by getting me to see his long-standing, over-arching project of Reconstruction. I'm very thankful for this book. Anyone interested in Theonomy would do well to read it, it's clear, well-organised, and gets to the heart of the issues (I did catch a couple of typos). It will give readers a greater sense of the concerns of people who have migrated to the Pacific Midwest (and as a Coloradan, I'm sure much of this translates to my home state), which might becoming more and more relevant to American believers.

[Andrew Canavan · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book because if one is in a Reformed church (especially west of the Mississippi) it is highly likely, sooner or later, that one will encounter someone influenced by Christian Reconstruction/theonomy. I appreciated the background Gribben gives to this movement and his clear aim to describe it as accurately and charitably as possible. It was helpful and I learned a lot I didn't know before. The book, however, was repetitive in places and returned very often to phrases (e.g. "the twilight of the American enlightenment" and "the end of white Christian America") which come from other recent works, but did so without explaining them to the reader. I was also expecting more development of the interviews Gribben and a colleague did during several trips to the Pacific Northwest but I'd guess that 95% of the book could exist unchanged without reference to those first-person accounts. While this is a helpful book, I was left wishing for a few modifications that could have strengthened its usefulness.

[Corinne · Rating 4 out of 5]

An important read for anyone who wants to better understand the sudden popularity of Christian Reconstructionism (Doug Wilson, Rushdoony, et al). The author outlines the basic tenets of this worldview as well as the events that propelled Christian Reconstructionist thought out of the fringes and into mainstream Evangelicalism. Gribben remains remarkably neutral, concealing his personal opinion and presenting only primary source data. He refrains, however, from speaking on the position of women within the movement — a perspective which would have added considerable depth to this portrait (but which might have made it impossible to maintain a neutral tone).

[Melody Schwarting · Rating 3 out of 5]

Crawford Gribben, a professor at Queen's University, Belfast, here explores Christian Reconstructionism in the Pacific Northwest, making some fascinating connections to Ireland along the way. With his research interests in dispensationalism and Reformed expressions of Christianity, it's no surprise he turned to the area some call the Redoubt, known for its many controversies, bombastic personalities, and prevalence of migration.

Gribben tries to combine a history of ideas concerning theonomy and Reconstruction with a look at the prevalence of those ideas in contemporary societies. As he points out, other scholars claim Reconstruction is dead. Gribben disagrees, and anyone who has had a whiff of Blog & Mablog must concur. Douglas Wilson, R. J. Rushdoony, and Gary North are the main subjects here, though the trio is not buddy-buddy. While all entertain Reconstructionist ideas, each has repackaged the deal for their communities.

Gribben, as a self-proclaimed outsider, doesn't always get the nuances of the USA right, in my opinion. He does very well, but in a few spots it's just not accurate. As a home school graduate myself, I think the "Education" chapter the weakest, because he paints the whole movement as a deeply right-wing, reactionary movement with precious few nods to secular or moderate home schooling. He never mentions school shootings and sex predation as reasons for reactionary home schooling, either, though the correlation between school shootings in the 1990s-2020s and rising numbers of home schools is not to be sneezed at. Back in elementary school, bullying was a reason often given by my friends regarding why their parents educated them at home. Reasons like special needs and developmental delays are not even mentioned, making Survival and Resistance a neurotypical study. This contrasts sharply with my own personal experience in different home schooling and church communities, where such differences are met with energetic, creative, and loving solutions.

Survival and Resistance as a whole is a bit weak compared to the program set out in its preface and introduction. Gribben evidently spent some time on research trips interviewing subjects, with access to personal papers such as those of R. J. Rushdoony. Yet, this angle fades in later chapters, or appears at the beginning of the chapter and fades later in the chapter. For example, the "Education" chapter draws heavily on secondary literature, and lacks the first-person interviews other books on home education lavishly provide. I'm not sure if this curtailing was due to the pandemic, but it seems that Gribben had ample opportunity to research on-site before the pandemic. If he was repeatedly turned down for interview requests, he does not mention it.

Other reviewers have rightly pointed out that Gribben ignores major controversies in Wilson's Moscow, Idaho church concerning child molestation. In the preface, Gribben says, "I have written this book as an outsider, and have not felt required to take positions on the controversies about theology, plagiarism, and pastoral care that have embroiled a number of the individuals and congregations that are discussed in this book." (xi) I am of two minds about this. First, I see his point about commenting on one controversy requiring him to comment on all of them. He is not writing an exposé, nor is he an investigative journalist, nor is Survival and Resistance about Wilson's Christ Church alone. Second, the incidents at Christ Church have a place in the discussion of Wilson's brand of Reformed Reconstructionism, especially in Gribben's chapters on "Government" and "Education." Since Gribben saw fit to comment on Paul Jennings Hill, a Reconstructionist assassin, it makes sense that he would comment on how a particular community handled charges of molestation, ensuing government involvement in court cases, reactions to alleged victims, and responses to the alleged perpretrators. Those situations say much about Christ Church's views on masculinity, femininity, personal responsibility, childhood, sexuality, and more. Even as I write this, I realize that Griben does not touch on those topics elsewhere in Survival and Resistance. It's not a gender studies book by any means, but the communities Gribben discusses are ripe for such an examination.

In all, Survival and Resistance succeeds in one very important aspect: Reconstructionists will likely find themselves well-represented here. Gribben does not devolve into potshots or revulsion, making use of a rather admirable effort at phenomenological understanding of a culture different from his own. Yet, in doing this, he perhaps fails to fully explore some controversies that make Survival and Resistance less useful than it should be. As an abolitionist historian, I hoped for a more robust examination of Wilson's proslavery arguments, but Gribben does not grapple with those here. He mentions them several times, but nearby lurks a claim that Black members of the community deny racism in Reconstructionist circles. Okay, then--set the charges of racism aside and simply look at proslavery argumentation! Another missed opportunity, in my opinion.

Recommended to those interested in scholarly examinations of Christian Reconstruction and Reformed survivalism.

[Michael Beatty · Rating 5 out of 5]

Dr. Gribben provides an excellent survey of the evangelical turn to resistance and survival. He allows the subjects of his study to speak for themselves, while providing historical commentary along the way.

[John-Jennifer Divito · Rating 4 out of 5]

With the recent revival of theonomy among Reformed Christians and the growing influence from Moscow, Idaho led by Doug Wilson, I have been very interested in reading this book by cultural historian Crawford Gribben, Survival and Resistance in Evangelical America: Christian Reconstruction in the Pacific Northwest. I am glad that I finally got my hands on a copy, and I quickly read it within a couple of weeks. While a scholarly work, it was well worth my time and proved to be an easy and informative read.

What was Gribben's purpose in researching and writing this book? To contextualize the contemporary Christian Reconstruction movement in the Pacific Northwest. The author summarizes well his argument in the conclusion: “But the argument of this book is that Christian Reconstruction is not dead anymore. Paradoxically, the failure of the first generation of theonomists to cohere, either personally or ideologically, has worked in the movement's favor, creating an internal marketplace of ideas by means of which competing groupings within political and religious conservatism have been able to appropriate and adopt their central arguments” (139).

Gribben begins by explaining the reaction of Christian Reconstructionists in light of the American cultural revolution that started in the 1960s. While many evangelical Christians worked to advance their moral and religious concerns through political involvement and social activism, others following Rousas John Rushdoony responded differently. They relocated to the Pacific Northwest to survive and resist the coming cultural collapse. This relocation has since been dubbed the American Redoubt.

As a result, Gribben summarizes what has taken place by considering the migration, postmillennial eschatology, view of government, practice of private and home education, and use of media in the growth of these beliefs and practices. Their migration gives them a location to freely carry out their convictions, their postmillennial eschatology provides them with the hope and expectation of success and victory, their views of government involve a rejection of modern democracy and appreciation of libertarianism free from government interference, their private and home education brings their children out of secular and statist instruction and into a largely classical approach of education in order to cultivate their views in the next generation, and their use of media both connects the disparate groups of Christian Reconstructionists and spreads their message around America to gain influence and expansion from a sympathetic and dissatisfied evangelical audience.

I found Gribben's portrayal fascinating and insightful. I already knew a number of names and theological views included, but the author has helped me to more clearly see their connection to what has developed in America over the last several decades. At the same time, I would have appreciated it if the author had more clearly connected the relationships between a number of persons and groups mentioned. Maybe these connections are hard, if not impossible, to make. But then it is challenging to know how much these groups and individuals share in common with each other, and how much they hold to the same beliefs and practices emphasized in Christian Reconstructionism.

Central to the growing popularity of this movement today is Douglas Wilson and the community in Moscow, Idaho. Yet I found Gribben's treatment of them somewhat uneven. He helpfully shows how important they have become to this movement and mentions the success of their “tempered theonomy,” but a number of their beliefs and practices seem somewhat detached. This could be due to the author's approach of covering each topic as a separate chapter, but the reader is left to bring them together.

This book has also already become somewhat dated. Published in 2021, it does not anticipate Donald Trump's second term as President, nor the increasing involvement of Moscow and other reconstructionists in the rise of Christian Nationalism. As a result, there seems to be a turn from the antipathy and removal from politics which was an earlier element of their movement. So some of the author's analysis no longer seems as descriptive today.

Nevertheless, this work is a valuable historical treatment of Christian Reconstructionism in the Pacific Northwest. I would encourage all of those interested in questions surrounding this movement to read Gribben's book. May it help us to wisely respond to those who have been impacted and influenced by its beliefs and practices.

[Giovanni Del Piero · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book for several reasons. I will be working with mostly evangelical and reformed types this summer, so I figured I should probably know a thing or two about them before I head over to DC. Though this book was written by an academic, I was encouraged by multiple positive reviews from those who adhere to the ideologies portrayed in this book. And since I have considered states like Idaho as potential places to live when I’m older, I thought I would give this book a shot.

It was highly informative, entertaining to read, and provides a wealth of citations for future reading. The author does a great job of letting the ideas and people speak for themselves, as well as refuting false distortions often pushed by mainstream sources regarding Christian Reconstructivism and theonomy, among a host of other topics.

The most interesting feature of this book was the parallels I found between the Reformed communities in the Northwest and Catholics at UD. Ross Douthat gave a lecture about two years ago at UD describing various Catholic political camps that were forming, such as the Integralists and those who adhered to the Benedict Option. What I found reading this book is that the Protestants are experiencing the same type of process. We have Integralists and they have theonomists; they have the American Redoubt, and we have the Benedict Option. Towards the end of the book, the author actually references Catholic political theorists Alasdair Macintyre and Patrick Deneen to highlight some of these similarities. In fact, in Moscow, Idaho, there is a liberal arts Christian college called New Saint Andrews, which is basically UD but for Reformed Calvinists, building a very similar generational community that UD has maintained over the years.

I think the most important lesson that this book and the subjects it talks about teach is that any type of political change is going to have to start at the individual level. Electing conservatives to positions of power and attempting to force prayer back into public schools wont work; instead, relying on subsidiarity- another catholic value- change should take place through evangelism, alternative education structures, and political activism “one county at a time”. As one reviewer put it, “every government has a god” and only once this is recognized will Christians be able to make effective progress.

On a final note, I highly recommend the work of the main person discussed in this book named Doug Wilson. Though I disagree with his more Reformed theological opinions, his publishing company, Canon Press, has republished the works of G.K Chesterton, and he has spoken highly of Chesterton along with Tolkien and high church Anglican C.S Lewis. Wilson has a lot of insight and knowledge that Catholics would benefit to learn from.

[Frode · Rating 2 out of 5]

Crawford Gribben, a resident of the UK, wrote Survival and Resistance in Evangelical America. The subtitle gives its focus, “Christian Reconstruction in the Pacific Northwest.” I live in the Pacific Northwest but not in Idaho, and I share some views of the Christian Reconstructionists, so the book interested me. It is not an easy read. Gribben writes long sentences and includes lots of quotes in them. I had to look up four words: kinist, bricolage, demotic, and fora. The first word was not in my Webster’s unabridged dictionary nor was it on dictionary.com. Over the years I have read some of R.J. Rushdoony’s works and some of the others mentioned, but I am not a great fan of Douglas Wilson. While I personally know a few of the folks in the Moscow churches and some others in churches belonging to the CREC, the denomination begun by Wilson and others, I belong to a conservative Presbyterian denomination that has no affiliation with the CREC.

I think Mr. Gribben paints with a wide brush at times, and I question a thing or two he seems to state as fact. Nonetheless, the book was interesting and somewhat informative although I think some will read it and think that the Christian Reconstruction movement, or what it has morphed into with the Wilson crowd, is somehow a threat to society or at least a subculture that bears watching. Gribben puts lots of diverse folks into the CR camp: Presbyterians, postmillennials, theonomists, reformed, paramilitary people and homeschoolers. He does admit that they are not united and in some cases don’t even know one another, but it’s a pretty wide loop.

The book is clearly organized into chapters that characterize parts of the movement. The migration chapter talks about the Redoubt being Northern Idaho and who came and why. The eschatology chapter focuses on postmillennialism and how it forms the outlook of folks on the near and distant future. The government chapter shows the views that some reconstruction types have toward government, politics, and culture. The media chapter talks mostly about the outpouring of materials from the Moscow church and the fiction and survivalist books of James Wesley Rawles, the latter being an author I had never heard of until now. In his chapter called “Conclusion,” Mr. Gribben summarizes what he thinks about it all. His conclusions are his opinions based on the research he has done. I don’t agree with all of them, but I share a few of them.

[Bob O'Bannon · Rating 5 out of 5]

Most Christians are concerned about the way American culture has been radically changing, but there is wide disagreement about how to respond. Some refuse to be alarmed and just blend in with the new normal, while others resort to conservative politics to effect the changes they think are necessary. And then there are those who are so convinced that our culture is damaged beyond repair, and have lost any confidence in the political system, that they have chosen to relocate to the “American redoubt” in the northwest USA and are basically seeking to start over. That’s what this book is about.

Central to this movement are contemporary leaders such as Pastor Douglas Wilson and writer James Wesley Rawles, and the great patriarch of the movement, the late theologian R.J. Rushdoony. Those in the reformed tradition will recognize Rushdoony’s name as a thought leader of theonomy, or Christian Reconstruction. Author Crawford Gribben does not offer theological critique of this controversial movement, but simply describes the migration to the Redoubt that is happening, with the suggestion that this might be the future of American evangelicalism. (p.15). There is plenty here to raise the eyebrow (shut down all public schools? p.102), but plenty here also to inspire and challenge the believer wondering what to do about our nation.

Tired of living in a radically secular culture? Move to Idaho! The idea is not to escape from the world, but to establish a vibrant Christian society that will survive when the rest of the culture crumbles before our eyes. “It is these evangelicals’ concern to rebuild the world from which they are withdrawing that so radically differentiates them from the politically passive pietists and politically engaged fundamentalists whom they have succeeded.” (p.14)

This movement to the Redoubt was brand new to me, and I suspect unknown to most Christians today. Gribbin has done us a great service by telling the story, and I suspect there will be more to tell in the coming years.

[Will Dole · Rating 4 out of 5]

A fascinating book. I grew up in the heart of the redoubt, surrounded by bookshelves housing works by Rawles and Wilson (two of the principal characters in Gribben's study). I've always found the overlap in influence of the Christian Reconstruction and Survivalist communities to be perplexing, as the disconnect in theologies seems pretty manifest (not that either group represents a monolith, however, their are basic tenets of each position which seem uncomfortable bedfellows, if not mutually exclusive to one another).

I was wondering if the author would render a verdict in the end, and the conclusion brought probably the most insightful lines of the book:

'The vision is as old as America--and it is shared by the program's critics. For both the advocates of this program for action and its critics share the assumption that America should be leading the way to a better world. The "paranoid style" that is shared by the subjects of this book and their critics parallels their shared and almost utopian conviction that the experience of Americans will herald the future if humanity. This is a distinctively American vision, and it suggests why neither the program nor the critical response it has provoked will be easily transported elsewhere.' (144)

Gribben's historical work is thorough, and the footnotes gave me plenty of titles to track down. The writing is very academic, which I probably shouldn't knock it for that given that it's written by an academic for a university press, but the prose is the only thing keeping this from being a five star book.

[Zak Schmoll · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a fascinating book. Most of you know that I greatly enjoy works about Christianity and sociology specifically relating to creating communities. This work does not judge those who migrate to the Redoubt but rather tries to understand why this movement continues to thrive. Driven initially by eschatology, this movement is characterized by a preparation for survival and resistance for the day when American culture collapses and then must be rebuilt. The author specifically highlights how institutions are already being built in education and media for the times ahead.

The temptation in a study like this is to either praise or condemn its subjects universally. I have a feeling that many books published through Oxford University Press would probably lean towards the latter. This book does not do that. It is extremely balanced and does not have very much bias in my opinion (although I know I have some Facebook friends from Moscow, Idaho, and I would love to hear how you all felt about the portrayal of your region). It does not shy away from praising the successes of this movement while critiquing its shortcomings.

Overall, I thought this book was excellent. If you are at all interested in Christianity and sociology, I highly recommend this work.