For those judging books by their cover (like me), it’s hard to discern the fact that this is a book for Christians that breaks down how scripture has been used throughout American history and not a book written about the impact of evangelical politicians and the shrinking separation of church and state. 

Scheiss dives into the rise of the “small government” ideology among Christians since the 1980s but only touches on the overturning of Roe v. Wade briefly in the introduction. A decision, regardless of whether you’re pro-choice or pro-life, is decidedly “big government”.  She touches on “Reaganomics”, it’s backing from pastors and theologians, and how the Bible’s scripture can be interpreted and applied to the economy, but she never dives into how “Reganomics” effected the economy long term. Like, these are policies that were largely endorsed by Christians in the 1980s and enforced by an openly Christian President that used his ideology to influence his policy, but you can’t talk about how they positively/negatively impacted the average American?

I know it’s sounds like I didn’t enjoy the book, but it did touch on both how people (presidents, founding fathers, political activists, etc) utilized/interpreted scripture differently (both the good and the bad), and it was well researched and informative. Scheiss understood how biases (like gender and race) impact your interpretation, and discusses the differences in white and black spirituality. 

I read this one as an audiobook, and should’ve written down more of my thoughts as I was listening, but you get the gist. Would I read again knowing what I know now? Probably? I don’t think Christianity will stop influencing our politics in the near future, so it’s not unwise to familiarize myself with the perspective of people with different viewpoints as me, but I was definitely not the target audience.