Matthew D. Taylor is a frequent resource for reporters covering religion in America, offering expert insight on faith, politics, and public life.
Matt is also a sought-after guest on podcasts, where he brings scholarly depth and accessible analysis to contemporary issues. This section of the site gathers his opinion pieces, interviews, media mentions, and podcast appearances in one place.
Everyone's talking about Natalie Harp this week — the aide who's become Trump's closest information gatekeeper. But almost no one is talking about where she came from. In this episode, Matt Taylor breaks down the specific evangelical homeschooling subculture in Southern California that shaped Harp — a world he knows firsthand, having grown up in it himself.
How a pardoned January 6th rioter, a Trump-allied pastor, and an electoral strategy converged on Michigan's Muslim community
Wisconsin state rep Francesca Hong, the clear front-runner in the Democratic gubernatorial primary, is facing a firestorm over a 2020 tweet calling to "cancel Thanksgiving..." With Wisconsin's race already tightening and a MAGA election-denier likely opponent waiting in the wings, Democrats need supermajority coalitions, not fights over a meal.
What happens when Christians begin to believe they are entitled to rule over everyone else? Matt joins Will Wright and Pastor Josh Burtram to explain how Christian nationalism fits inside a much older story of Christian supremacy, empire, and political power.
As public opinion sours on Israel, a young generation of evangelical leaders is stepping up to keep the war machine running.
Why a Silicon Valley Billionaire’s Apocalyptic Theology Deserves our Attention.
“It’s pretty common to have people involved in a Christian nationalist narrative, a Christian nationalist agenda, a Christian nationalist philosophy but not be very deep Christians themselves,” Taylor said. “If they’re a regular Fox News person, if they hang out in right-wing circles, it’s the media they consume, the cultural tribe they belong to.”
“It’s a very useful way to get around the Christian imperative to love your enemy,” Matthew Taylor told me. “For the most part, that is the ironclad command. So how do you get Christians to hate their enemies? Or to hate them even if they love them? Demons are easy to hate. They are irredeemable objects of hatred.”
The Violent Take it by Force: The Christian Movement that is Threatening Our Democracy
Matthew D. Taylor, Center on Faith + Justice, Georgetown University
UCCS Chapman Hall, ENT Center for the Arts
EXCLUSIVE: The former Fox News pundit joins a number of other public figures who've embraced the Appeal to Heaven flag.
Why did Tucker Carlson replace the American flag in his studio with the “Appeal to Heaven” flag? In this video, Matthew D. Taylor examines a subtle but revealing change in Tucker Carlson's podcast studio: the replacement of a framed American flag with the increasingly controversial Appeal to Heaven flag.
[34:14] Host Brooke Gladstone sits down with Matthew D. Taylor to discuss how the growing factions in the Republican party over Israel and the Iran war are part-policy, part-divergent Christian theologies.
It’s no secret that Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth has embraced the idea of crusading for American dominance — he published a book titled American Crusade and has several tattoos of crusader iconography. And that language has become a part of how Hegseth talks about the U.S. war with Iran. B.A. Parker talks to the religion scholar Matthew Taylor about Hegseth’s corner of Christianity and its connection with Christian nationalism.
Matthew Taylor sees Pursuit’s new leadership as deliberately choosing the Pacific Northwest for its oppositional potential, comparing their strategy directly to Mark Driscoll’s at Mars Hill, who relished in his opposition to Seattle culture.
Religious studies scholar Dr. Matthew D. Taylor joins to explain how NAR networks, charismatic prophecy, and Trumpist politics have converged into a movement that sees itself not as lobbying the state, but as reclaiming it for God.
This presentation maps the fault lines of a low-grade civil war erupting inside Donald Trump’s base: who the key players are, what they actually believe, and what their conflict could mean for the future of American politics.
It’s all out in the open if you choose to listen and pay attention. They’re playing for all the marbles and are willing to use violence to achieve their nefarious ends. If you don’t believe, just listen to former Christian nationalist Tim Whitaker and scholar Matthew Taylor, author of The Violent Take It by Force, Defying Tyrants, and Scripture People.
The White House has designated today for a prayer event on the National Mall. NPR's Ayesha Rascoe talks with religious studies scholar Matthew D. Taylor about what's behind "Rededicate 250."
Matthew D. Taylor unpacks how Christian nationalism, spiritual warfare, and authoritarian mythologies are reshaping democracy, fueling violence, and distorting faith. If you're wondering why faith is being weaponized to justify tyranny or how religion fuels the dangerous myth of angels vs. demons in today’s politics, this episode reveals the startling truth behind the headlines.
“Christian nationalism isn’t one thing,” Taylor told CT. “We’re using this one phrase to capture a number of different phenomena.” Some proponents are nostalgic for a time when Christianity was more culturally prominent, Taylor said. Others want Christians to be a privileged class in society, which he classifies as “Christian supremacy.”
The Trump administration is planning to host an all-day prayer festival on the National Mall this weekend. The event is raising questions about the separation of church and state. Visiting scholar at the Center on Faith and Justice at Georgetown University Matthew Taylor and former Under Secretary of State for Diplomacy and Public Affairs Richard Stengel join Chris Jansing to weigh in.
“There’s this very sharp tension going on right now, I’d even call it a low-grade civil war, between the more Christian Zionist factions that are very pro-Israel, very pro-war in Iran … versus this kind of rising tide of antisemites in the far-right coalition,” Taylor said.
Brad Onishi hosts a live event panel with Sarah Posner, Dr. Julie Ingersoll, and Dr. Matthew D. Taylor on the religious dimensions of the Iran conflict and its effects on Christian nationalism and MAGA.
Many religion scholars, Weaver-Zercher says, see the rise of authoritarianism under Trump as a deeply theological problem. “We have to have a robust theological response,” she explains, pointing to Defying Tyrants: Following Jesus in a World of Christian Antichrists (Broadleaf, Oct.) by Matthew D. Taylor, an expert on Christian extremism. The book draws on scripture to challenge people who abuse power in the name of Jesus.
After 'Trump Jesus' and J D Vance 'popesplaining' the theory of a just war to the Pontiff, Heidi Siegmund Cuda interviews Dr Matthew Taylor on defying the real 'antichrists' of Christian supremacy
This week on The God Squad Podcast, Desimber Rose & Dillon Naber Cruz sit down with one of the most important voices in the conversation around faith and powerDr. Matthew D. Taylor. Fresh off his recent appearance on CNN with Jake Tapper, Dr. Taylor brings clarity, depth, and a much-needed reality check to the growing influence of Christian nationalism and extremist movements shaping both religion and politics in America.
Matthew D. Taylor is a visiting scholar at the Center on Faith and Justice at Georgetown University. He is the author of The Violent Take It by Force and, forthcoming, Defying Tyrants.
Taylor’s forthcoming book, Defying Tyrants, is a theological manifesto that speaks directly to Christians who are drawn to so-called Christian Nationalism... “If they [the Christian Right] are the only ones making religious arguments, they’re going to win that argument over people speaking only in the language of Enlightenment values,” he says.
Taylor said the invocation of ancient Scriptures invoked amid modern military conflict raises a “very, very significant question.”
“Do the Geneva Conventions apply to a holy war? Do the Geneva Conventions apply to an apocalyptic war? Because that is what Trump is threatening,” said Taylor.
Matthew Taylor from Georgetown University's Center on Faith & Justice joins The Lead.
In Part 2 of my interview with Matthew Taylor, we move from defining Christian antichrists to exposing the movements trying to reshape American politics and religion in real time. We break down the three major wings of Christian nationalism now competing for power inside MAGA.
Is it fair — or even biblical — to apply the word "antichrist" to a political movement? Visiting scholar Matthew D. Taylor (Georgetown University) answers that question from scripture and history. In this conversation, I sit down with Matthew Taylor, author of Defying Tyrants: Following Jesus in a World of Christian Antichrists, to explore one of the most uncomfortable questions in American Christianity today: when does a Christian movement begin to exhibit the spirit of antichrist?
“Hegseth's Christian nationalist rhetoric is part of a broader effort…to run back the clock and take us back to a time before all that diversity and complexity became part and parcel of U.S. culture and identity,” Taylor said.