MEP Gyöngyösi: Christian politics is not political Christianism

I had a very joyful experience last week: after years of negotiations, discussions and several joint events, I was admitted to a European party family. Furthermore, it is the European Christian Political Movement, the only European political party group explicitly focusing its programme on promoting Christian values.

As a practising Christian and an MEP wishing to represent a value-oriented policy, this success and the prospect of working together with my new allies fills me with great joy and gives me a huge inspiration, especially because Christianity and value-oriented politics both have to endure relentless attacks.

We all know how lifestyle leftists and the social engineering politicians who have converted the momentum of the old Marxist class struggle into a woke agenda are now trying to erase Christianity even from the memory of Western societies. Their intentions are clearly revealed by each step they take to deny the role of the traditional family, to redact any reference to our Christian heritage from our documents or to openly demonize certain groups of the society.

However, Christianity is also exposed to another, typically insidious threat that is often more difficult to identify. It is the political Christianism that sprouted from the soil of the populist right (or was carefully designed by Moscow spin doctors). The representatives of this political agenda spare no effort to make extremely loud references to Christianity, families and defending our culture while demonizing individuals and stigmatizing social groups just as enthusiastically as the warriors of woke insanity.

Political Christianism loves and supports the external symbols of Christianity, such as churches, ceremonies or spectacular and loud expressions of faith, because all of them can be tied to political organization. 

On the other hand, it completely lacks such real Christian values as solidarity, forgiveness and the respect for human dignity, because they cannot be utilized directly for political purposes. As a result, political Christianism doesn’t really promote Christian values. In fact, it devours and empties Christianity, degrading it to a simple political product.

It is an important task for us, Christian politicians to demonstrate the true nature of Christianity through our work, even if it’s quite difficult in today’s world.

I am glad to see that ECPM understands it, and I am confident that we will be able to cooperate in promoting a political programme that reflects the true spirit of Christianity.

Disclaimer: the sole liability for the opinions stated rests with the author(s). These opinions do not necessarily reflect the official position of the European Parliament.