Bible sales in the United States have skyrocketed in 2024, religious colleges are seeing enrollment boosts despite overall declines in higher education attendance and several states are pushing for Bible-based curriculum in public schools. Some Bible scholars believe this may mark a significant cultural shift.

“While it has been apparent to a few of us for some time, millions are now realizing that ‘woke’ ideologies are, in fact, destructive attempts to re-found the nation according to a new civic religion which both parodies and persecutes Christianity,” Chad Pecknold, theologian and professor at The Catholic University of America, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Despite overall book sales increasing by only 1% compared to 2023, Bible sales in the U.S. have reached an impressive 22% increase as of October 2024, according to the Wall Street Journal.

The Cardinal Newman Society in October reported that enrollment at Catholic colleges has risen in 2024 despite an overall enrollment decrease at other institutions, with several schools such as Ave Maria University in Florida and Benedictine College in Kansas seeing record growth, increasing attendance by more than 20% over the last 10 years.

“There is a resurgence of Christianity among young people,” Wade Burleson, retired pastor and president of Istoria Ministries, told the DCNF. “I see what is happening [as] more of an Awakening. An Awakening occurs when the irreligious come to faith in Christ.”

Burleson pointed to several instances of young people coming into faith in doves in recent years, with hundreds of students being baptized on campuses across the nation, including several members of the four-time national champion Oklahoma University women’s softball team.

“There have been three Great Awakenings in America, and a few smaller ones,” Burleson continued. “I believe we are in the beginning of a fourth Great Awakening and it is a response to inflation (financial panic), pandemics (Covid), wars (global), and the sudden death of stability in America. There is no anchor in life better than the Anchor of Hope, and when the ship of life is tossed to and fro, faith awakens.”

Pecknold shared this sentiment, arguing that far-left politics have driven Americans towards Christianity.

“Democrats, and the corporations and institutions they controlled, embraced this pseudo-civic religion in their attempt to take total control over the American republic,” Pecknold said. “The American people saw their totalitarian appetites on display in everything from forced vaccinations to extreme racialism to the redefinition of marriage and the denial of sexual difference, all under the ever-evolving banner of ‘the Progress Flag.’”

“This is when the Democrats were defeated so thoroughly on November 5th, it was not only seen as a political victory, but also as a religious victory: it was a repudiation of the ersatz civic religion that Democrats had used to re-found the country.”

Catholic voters played a pivotal role in the 2024 presidential election, making up approximately 25% of the vote and overwhelmingly siding with President-elect Donald Trump, with other Christian voters following suit.

This was a surprising revelation considering tens of millions of Christians were expected to refrain from voting, citing a dislike of both candidates and general uninterest in politics, according to Relevant Magazine. Some religious organizations, however, made efforts to warn voters prior to the election that the Democratic ticket was “patently anti-religious.”

Greg Boyd, theologian and Pastor at Woodland Hills Church in St. Paul, Minnesota is less convinced of this religious revival.

“My concern is that a lot of it seems to be wrapped up with nationalism,” Boyd told the DCNF. “And it concerns me because whenever the Christian faith has gotten too close to political power, it’s been transformed by the political power, and we have Christians trying to control others and conquer others, the same as we’ve had throughout history. And in my opinion, that doesn’t look anything [like] what we find in the Gospel.”

Boyd pointed to examples of states like Texas, Louisiana and Oklahoma approving the implementation of Bible lessons into public school lessons. Texas’ law is meant to help “students to better understand the connection of history, art, community, literature, and religion on pivotal events” in history and Oklahoma’s is similarly meant “as an instructional support into the curriculum.”

“Where did Jesus ever impose himself on others?” the pastor asked.

“I mean, I would love to see a revival in the country,” Boyd said. “The evidence of that would be, I would think, people become more Christ-like, they become more loving. They would be trying to turn the other cheek, trying to reach out across the aisle and build bridges instead of walls. And I don’t see any of that happening with the church as a whole. Seems like it’s kind of gone deeply into political polarization.”

Boyd agreed that many issues in politics have driven people to view current affairs through a religious lens.

Cultural issues such as abortion, gender ideology and diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) have been hot topics dividing Americans’ opinions, especially religious Americans. The ongoing war in Gaza, as well as the hundreds of protests that spanned the U.S. in response, also impacted Christians’ perspective, with many viewing the apparent prosecution of Jews on college campuses as an infringement on religious freedom as a whole.

Church attendance among Christians remains relatively low in the United States, with only 30% of Protestants and 23% of Catholics attending church every week, according to a March Gallup poll. However, more Americans than ever are consuming religious content, with the Hallow prayer app becoming the first religious app to top Apple’s App Store in 2024 and Fr. Mike Schmitz’s Bible In A Year podcast consistently topping charts in recent years, according to National Review.

Young men in particular are maintaining their devotion to faith, with more Gen Z men identifying as Christian than women for the first time, according to the New York Times.

“We are currently seeing a kind of clarity about the civilizational conflict that ‘woke’ ideologies provoked,” Pecknold told the DCNF. “In brief, the people are fed up with this fake religion, and even if they aren’t Christian themselves, they’re realizing that Christianity provides a far better ‘unwritten constitution’ for the nation than anti-Christian wokism can supply. There’s a simple realization at work here.”

“Christianity is an ordering principle which elevates and ennobles souls, families, and societies — it’s inherently public, and cannot be ‘privatized,’ relegated to the margins, or separated from questions of education, heritage, public morality, family policy, law, or the aspirations of nations,” Pecknold said. “We still date time by the Incarnation because, deep down, everyone knows that Christianity is objectively true and good for all people — it roots us in reality, it helps us to promote the truly good, and avoid those evils which cause so much suffering — it elevates us by the Light of Christ. Public Christianity is literally what makes civilizational renewal possible. The fact that Americans are remembering this, and having the courage to state it, is a sign of great hope for the nation.”

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So, in the op-ed pages of the failing New York Times and during the prime-time group therapy sessions broadcast from the bankrupt studios of CNN and MSNBC, Democrat operatives tiptoe around many taboo subjects while suggesting to their fellow congregants that the Democrat party must atone for its loss of earthly power.  Influential clergymen from Barack Obama’s own “woke” order have even gone so far as to publicly confess the commission of what is by far the gravest Democrat sin: “We’re losing the culture war.”

Egad!  That’s the one war Democrats are unwilling to lose!  They must be perceived as the “cool” ones at all times.  So imperiling is the prospect of surrendering their reputation for being hip and trendy that Democrats will do anything to remain relevant.  Smug pretentiousness doesn’t look sexy when you’re constantly being depantsed in viral videos and on social media.  Glib aloofness looks a lot like stupidity when ignorant celebrities can’t hide behind their pop-culture mystiques and glamour shots.

If Democrats aren’t in charge of the culture, they can’t be in charge of anything else for long either.  Without a monopoly over the haute couture of fame and public adulation, they are no more than an odd collection of doomsayers, snake oil salesmen, carnival barkers, streetwalkers, has-beens, pseudo-intellectuals, hormone-raging adolescents, and empty suits.  If the public sees them as they actually are, they will never be allowed to hold power again.  It’s never good policy to let the inmates run the asylum.  It’s downright deadly to give the inmates nuclear weapons and control over the economy.

Understandably, Democrats are freaking out about their loss of social prestige.  They expected the public to defer to the wishes of noted climatologist (snark!) Greta Thunberg as she dictates to farmers across the globe what they can and cannot do with their private lands.  They expected fearful citizens to obey the pandemic-loving Anthony Fauci’s every command.  They expected women to vote for Kamala Harris because Taylor Swift endorsed her from a pyrotechnic-lit stage.  They expected blue-collar workers to reject President Trump’s “America First” agenda because Robert De Niro wasted the last eight years playing an angry, old man with a single line: “F*ck Trump!”  They expected Green Day’s hatred for MAGA voters to keep the “cool kids” caged on the Democrats’ soul-crushing plantation.  Celebrities flooded the 2024 pop-culture space with anti-Trump histrionics, cringeworthy temper-tantrums, and a glut of Democrat party endorsements.  The public tuned out all the noise and voted for Trump anyway.

You mean the Hollyweirdos, fake scientists, lip-syncing twerkers, aging rock stars, and teenaged “influencers” have lost control over the mind-melded masses?  Gaia forfend!  Quick, call in the liposuction plumbers, the botox brigades, and the lighting specialists: we must remind Americans that the celebrity class is filled with bona fide stars!  Who do the folks living in the lowlands of the Missouri Bootheel think they are?  When Bob De Niro, the queen of Swifties, and boy bands who are old enough to qualify for senior citizen discounts tell you to vote for Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, or Kamala Harris, you better hop to it!  Being rich and famous entitles dumb people to tell working-class people what to do.

Or…just spitballing here…maybe Americans have grown tired of caring about the opinions of a bunch of California communists who pal around with sexual predators, debaucherous drug enthusiasts, habitual rehab guests, angry narcissists, profligate poobahs, and intellectual poseurs who can barely read.  Perhaps Americans finally see Hollywood’s undeservedly rich and famous as the dimwitted, morally vacuous cretins and reprobates they’ve always been.  Could that be why “woke” Disney, late night scolds posing as comedians, and politics-pushing actors have lost their influence over the American people?  There’s no question that Hollywood’s stars have dimmed.  Even aw-shucks “everyman” Tom Hanks now suffers at the box-office after pimping for the Democrats’ favorite flavors of socialism the last few years.  (Spoiler alert: all the flavors of socialism taste like dirt because socialism always leads to murder, starvation, and mass graves.)

Americans have definitely seen through the celebrity class’s layers of plastic surgery and recognized Hollywood for what it is: a feeding ground for lost and damaged souls.  Voters have rejected the political pablum of Rob Reiner, Rosie O’Donnell, Oprah Winfrey, George Clooney, Mark Ruffalo, and other Tinseltown snobs because their opinions hold no weight.  Americans can think for themselves.  The good people of “flyover country” have nothing to learn from the vain pontifications of coastal “elites.”

There is a more salient reason why Americans of all backgrounds now avoid the Democrat party’s army of celebrity influencers as if their opinions were as malodorous as spoiled milk sitting under an Arizona sun: there is absolutely nothing “cool” about being a Democrat these days.  If you want to get a stern lecture, you hang out with Democrats.  If you want to have a good time with other happy people, you go to a Trump rally.  If you scrutinize all jokes for their compliance with the tenets of “political correctness,” then you vote Democrat.  If you make jokes without worrying about “triggering” somebody, then Democrat operatives are most likely censoring whatever you say online.  Nobody likes being censored.  And as shocking as this must be to Deep State Democrats, censorship isn’t “cool.”

Over Thanksgiving, President Trump released a Christmas Vacation parody in which he comically roasted his Democrat rivals.  Vice President-elect Vance shared Norman Rockwell’s iconic Freedom from Want oil painting of Thanksgiving dinner and photoshopped the father and mother figures with Trump and Vance serving their family a beautiful map of Republican-voting America.  Both posts were hilarious holiday treats that millions of Americans enjoyed seeing.  Democrats, however, found the light humor terribly disturbing.  After all, they’ve decried Donald Trump as “literally Hitler” for eight long years, and Americans should not be amused when “Hitler” trolls the political opposition with funny Internet memes.  Haven’t Americans been listening to Democrats’ stern lectures: “Democracy” is at stake!

Democrats are not the party of “live and let live.”  They are not the party of individualism, intellectual open-mindedness, or rebellion against the status quo.  They are not the party of free speech or free expression.

They are the party of rules, regulations, and intrusive laws.  They are the party of mandates, de-banking, social “cancellation,” and dogmatic beliefs.  They are the thought police.

If you want to be told what you can and cannot do, you vote for Democrats.  If you want to make your own decisions, you never vote for Democrats.  The Democrat party has become nothing but a religious cult intent on punishing Americans for their heretical transgressions.  It is no wonder, then, why Americans are running away from leftism and towards President Trump’s MAGA coalition.  As Elon Musk’s mom recently observed, President Trump seems to be “having fun.”  Happy Americans want to have fun, too.  They voted accordingly.