The American Christian Crusade That Killed Charlie Kirk.

Exploring American Christian History and What Causes Hate-based Killings.

Charlie Kirk prays as he attends “Freedom Night In America” at Dream City Church on October 5, 2022 in Phoenix, Arizona

There's a peculiar alchemy that occurs when someone dies. The harsh edges of a life get smoothed over, the contradictions resolved, the uncomfortable truths buried deeper than the body itself. We've witnessed this transformation countless times—controversial figures like Charlie Kirk suddenly becoming "complicated" or "products of their time," their obituaries reading like carefully edited résumés rather than honest reckonings with full human complexity. But when we examine the landscape of American Christianity over the past fifty years, the sanitization has happened while the perpetrators are still very much alive, still collecting tax-exempt donations, still wrapping themselves in the flag and the cross while leaving a trail of documented carnage that would make a cartel boss blush.

The dirty little secret about American Christianity isn't that it's been corrupted b…