The Christian Right began to play it's hand in the 1970's when Ronald Reagan began his run for the Republican nomination for President against Gerald Ford.
The Back to Basics movements began running candidates for school boards in local elections across the country.
With the defeat of Reagan at the Republican convention in 1976 and the election of Born Again Democrat Jimmy Carter in 1980; Jerry Falwell created the Moral Majority and the evangelical Political movement took form.
In the US in 1980 Christian leaders and members of the religious right rallied in Washington DC on April 29th and 30th, for an event called Washington for Jesus. Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Dr. William Bright, Benson Idahosa from Africa, and many other high-profile Christians marched on Washington DC, in an effort to get Ronald Reagan, the opposing republican candidate to oust then-Democratic candidate Jimmy Carter.
The process of bringing God into American Politics had begun. The Christian Right of America was intent on forcing the hand of God.
Thy Kingdom come...Thy will be done...on earth as it is in Heaven
Central to Christian activism is the Rapture, the Tribulation, Reconstruction and Dominionism, the Apocalypse and the Second Coming of Jesus.
(Frederick Clarkson and DogEmperor are two of my most favored writers and I recommend everyone take time to read their well researched diaries for more information and insight on this topic.)
In the year 2000, the Christian Right came to full power with the election of George Bush as President. With the Legislative, Executive and Judicial branches of government clearly in Christian evangelical control of The United States government; surely the Second coming of Jesus was at hand.
All that remained for the highly charged Christian voting block was an Apocalypse and the The prophetical destruction of Babylon to usher in the advent of Christ to receive his earthly kingdom. A 2000 year old drama of epic proportions arriving exactly on the date with the timely and dramatic Impeachment of Bill Clinton.
9-11 and the war in Iraq were just those long awaited events of Biblical prophecy and frenzied pulpit eschatologies. Many of my acquaintances and even family began to prepare for the end. In Colorado Springs, the Vatican of evangelical America, the pitch was most notably frenetic.
For those of us who labor as activists in Progressive politics and belong to a reality based community; it is sometimes incredible to believe that there are millions of people who live solely on their faith in the Apocalypse and the Book of Revelations in the Bible.
For the past 7 years the attempts to Christian Nationalism and unwittingly vote for Theocracy has produced mixed reviews and an abysmal record for Christian Theocratics. In fact, a great disappointment for many. The coordinated and systemic attacks on Liberal Ideals and Social institutions had left many progressives unprepared and uninformed to respond to the elections of 2000,2002 and 2004.
If the leaders of this Christianist movement had any intellectual honesty, they would be forced to admit that God has not really "blessed America" while under their stewardship for the last 7 years. The sad reality of the decline of American prestige is a testament of their folly and badly failed ideas and agendas. The historical results of their failures are too numerous to recount here. Suffice it to say, that the mantle of discipleship and stewardship of the social contracts with America and the rest of the world are under the sole historical domain and stewardship of secular Progressives and their main stream Liberal Christian friends and allies for almost 100 years now.
The Christian Right idea of taking Dominion over secular society gained widespread currency with the 1981 publication of evangelical philosopher Francis Schaeffer's book - "A Christian Manifesto". The book sold 290,000 copies in its first year, and it remains one of the movement's most frequently cited texts.
There are a variety of ideological tendencies within the Christian Right. At the truly extreme end of the spectrum is a set of ideas proponents call "Reconstructionism", associated with only a small number of think tanks and book publishers. Many Christian Right activists have never even heard of reconstructionism, whose advocates call for the imposition of an Old Testament style theocracy, complete with capital punishment for offenses including adultery, homosexuality, and blasphemy.
The Christian Right, like other mass movements, is a collection of internal contradictions which work themselves out in the course of real political activism. We here at Daily Kos are discovering that reality ourselves. Governance, influence and ideas have implicit consequences, but ideas also have a cause and effect dimension, rooted in interests and desires of competing ideologies. To be fair, we were first accused of trying to take over America with secular humanism.
Political mass movements are always in a state of tension over their own missions. Part movement to resist and roll back even moderate change, part reactionary wing of prevailing political realities and re-evolutionary social and/or economic injustices.
The Christian Right wants to take dominion and collaborate with the existing political-economic system, at the same time as we do...
We Liberal critics (who also endorse the ruling system) can recognize only the Christian Right's takeover dimension. Oftentimes we are relegated to Conspriracy Theorists and "haters" as we can see that the Dominion project is dangerous... because it is, in part as Ronald Reagan said,... "Business as usual".
Recommended Diary at Progressive Historians