A Field Guide to Rededicate 250

Why we should be concerned about Sunday's White House-sponsored Christian nationalist event on the National Mall

On Sunday, May 17th, 2026, tens of thousands of American Christians will gather in Washington DC on the National Mall for the White House-promoted, government-sponsored “Rededicate 250” — a nine-hour event. As a scholar who studies many of the people involved, I offer this field guide for reporters, commentators, scholars, and activists trying to decipher the leaders, symbols, and messages of the day. In short, this event promises to not merely be a backward-looking festival of Christian nationalism but an important beachhead for narratives of Christian supremacy in America.

What does “rededicate” mean — and why does it matter?

The organizers say they aim to enact the “rededication of our country as One Nation to God.” Grammatically, to rededicate something means it was already dedicated — so when do they think the United States was first dedicated to God?

Various Christian nationalist narratives locate America’s covenantal roots in colonial-era prayers, sermons preached at Jamestown or Massachusetts Bay, or in the founding moment of 1776 itself. Since this event is pegged to the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, expect a lot of Appeal to Heaven flags (a favorite contemporary Christian nationalist symbol) and exaggerated accounts of the founders’ piety.

In reality, the founding era was heavily shaped by Enlightenment philosophy. That’s how we got the First Amendment in the first place: the founders were quite aware of how many destructive and harmful models of established churches in Europe had led to religious wars and the persecution of non-conforming Christians (not to mention Jews, Muslims, free-thinking skeptics, etc.). They were courageous enough to try an experiment: what if we separated out the functioning of the government from religious arguments and intra-Christian power plays and just let the government be neutral.

Many founders identified as Christians, but they were a far cry from modern evangelicals, and narratives of their devotion to God tend to severely overreach. This myth of a Christian founding is nonetheless central to American Christian nationalism and is promoted most prominently by the pseudo-historian David Barton, who might not be a listed speaker for the event but whose fingerprints are all over Rededicate 250.

What’s the forward-looking agenda?

The core concerns of Sunday’s event are not primarily historical. Rededicate 250 is one piece of a broader effort, inside and outside the Trump administration, to use federal power to Christianize — or, as they would have it, reChristianize — the nation. Other expressions of this agenda already implemented since January 2025 include:

• A more powerful White House Faith Office. Led by Paula White-Cain, Trump’s trusted spiritual adviser, this iteration has more direct policy influence than any previous version of a faith liaison office inside the White House. Complementary offices have been established across federal agencies, creating an unprecedented integration of faith into government.

• The “Task Force to Eradicate Anti-Christian Bias.” Roughly 63% of Americans identify as Christians. Claims of widespread persecution of this religious majority are absurd — but this task force, staffed by White-Cain and prominent cabinet members, actively fuels those narratives. Their recent report makes clear that “anti-Christian bias” means anything that infringes on the privileges of politically conservative Christians.

• National Security Presidential Memo 7 (NSPM-7). This severely under-reported Trump administration declaration defines domestic terrorism partly in terms of “anti-Americanism, anti-capitalism, and anti-Christianity… and hostility towards those who hold traditional American views on family, religion, and morality.” In other words: push back on their vision of Christian America, and you risk being labeled a domestic terrorist.

• A bombing campaign in Nigeria. Beginning Christmas Day 2025, Trump ordered strikes on Muslim groups supposedly targeting Christians — though the situation on the ground is far more complex. What’s new and significant is that it has apparently become U.S. policy to protect (some) non-American Christians abroad. Why only Christians?

Rededicate 250 is part of this same project. By staging a government-sponsored religious dedication ceremony on the National Mall, organizers are creating a new “fact on the ground”: a symbolic baptism of the American state in MAGA Christianity. Their goal is not merely Christian nationalism — the claim that the U.S. is especially Christian — but Christian supremacy: privileging Christianity over other religious and nonreligious worldviews in policy, and offering premium citizenship to their kind of Christian.

Implicitly, this leaves out not only the roughly 37% of Americans who don’t identify as Christian, but also the many Christians who — like me — want no part of Christian nationalism. I don’t need my government to align with Christianity to validate my faith. In fact, I’d prefer it to remain neutral on religion: that’s part of the basic bargain of the Declaration of Independence. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness belong to atheists, Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, Hindus, and every other identity that has historically flourished in the United States.

Who organized this?

The real force behind Rededicate 250 is the White House Faith Office. Featured speakers are either administration members (Pete Hegseth, Marco Rubio), prominent Trump evangelical advisers (Paula White-Cain, Franklin Graham, Robert Jeffress), or close Faith Office allies (Ben Carson, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Eric Metaxas).

Worth noting: the White House Faith Office is closely tied not just to evangelicalism broadly, but specifically to the Independent Charismatic sector — think nondenominational Pentecostals. Expect their distinctive aesthetic throughout the day: high-powered worship music, spiritual warfare language, Jewish symbols and Old Testament imagery, declarations of blessing, modern prophecy, and vocal support for Israel.

Does this violate the First Amendment?

It clearly violates the principle of church-state separation. Government employees and government funding are flowing into an explicitly evangelical Christian event designed to sacralize the Trump administration and privilege Christianity over other perspectives. Many of the organizers are openly contemptuous of the principle of separation of church and state itself.

Whether it violates the letter of the First Amendment is more complicated. What the Amendment technically bars is Congress passing a law establishing an official religion — and that isn’t literally happening here. This is the executive branch symbolically and tactically establishing Christianity: more like an executive order than legislation. Still, it is a clear violation of the underlying principles the Amendment was meant to protect.

Is this unprecedented?

Yes and no. Government sponsorship of a sectarian Christian event at this scale is unprecedented in the modern era. But many of the organizers have been staging large Christian nationalist gatherings on the National Mall for more than a quarter century. Lou Engle — an Independent Charismatic prophet associated with the New Apostolic Reformation — first came to prominence organizing “The Call DC“ in September 2000. Similar events have occurred on the Mall repeatedly, often timed to elections.

What is new is the government sponsorship. That was always the aspiration of these previous gatherings: to reach the point where their vision of Christian America would be so embedded in government that these symbolic dedication events could translate into real policy change from the inside out.

Is this “white” Christian nationalism?

It’s clearly Christian nationalism, but this event — shaped by the White House Faith Office — reflects a more global and multiethnic version of Christian nationalism. Expect prominent non-white speakers, including Trump adviser and NAR apostle Guillermo Maldonado and evangelist Alveda King (niece of Martin Luther King Jr.). The messages will probably draw heavily on the history of white Christianity in America, but I expect organizers will avoid explicit white supremacy narratives in favor of a more inclusive multiethnic American Christian supremacy.

Who are the key speakers?

Legacy evangelical leaders of the Religious Right: Franklin Graham, Cissie Graham Lynch, Robert Jeffress, Jonathan Falwell, Jack Graham

Independent Charismatic and Pentecostal leaders associated with Paula White-Cain: Jentezen Franklin, Samuel Rodriguez, Guillermo Maldonado, Lorenzo Sewell, Lou Engle, Kelvin Cobaris, Alveda C. King, Gordon P. Robertson

Token non-evangelical Catholic and Jewish leaders (drawn from Trump’s Religious Liberty Commission): Bishop Robert Barron, Cardinal Timothy Dolan, Rabbi Meir Soloveichik