Report

Beyond “Christian nationalism”: Measuring attitudes to Christianity and Britishness today

This report from UK think tank Theos unpacks their polling on Christianity and Britishness.

A major new study into Christianity and British identity has revealed a complex and sometimes paradoxical picture of faith, culture, and politics in Britain today. The report suggests that what is increasingly being described as “Christian nationalism” in Britain is not simply an import from the United States, but a distinctively British phenomenon bound up with questions of culture, heritage, political views, and immigration as much as Christian belief and practice.

At a time when crosses have been carried at Unite the Kingdom rallies and crowds have chanted “Christ is King” at protests, the research finds Christianity being invoked as a marker of British identity amid wider anxieties about Islam immigration, cultural change and what it means to be British.

But this increasing prominence should not be confused with a renewal of Christian practice. Because the research revealed a striking paradox: the group that comes closest to what is most often understood as “Christian nationalist” – termed ‘Identity Integrationists’ by the researchers – is the one most likely to contain nominal or non-practising Christians. People in this group identify strongly with Christianity and overwhelmingly want to see it embedded in British national life, but their Christianity is particularly associated with identity, culture and heritage.