Thousands of conservative Christians gathered in Florida this week for a “Fire and Glory Tour,” organized by right-wing evangelists Mario Murillo and Lance Wallanu, who are associated with the dominionist New Apostolic Reformation.
Both Murillo and Wallnau are conspiracy theorists and unabashed Trump cultists who have declared that Christians must never accept the results of the 2020 election, warning that accepting that Joe Biden is president is a sign of disloyalty to God. Given such views, it was no surprise that the event was filled with right-wing rants, corporate prayers for Trump, and Christian nationalist rhetoric, such as when speaker Floyd Brown, founder of The Western Journal, urged the audience to “take back America” by having their church literally take over their hometowns.
“Every church should run their town,” Floyd proclaimed.
Floyd Brown, founder of The Western Journal, declares that right-wing Christians must “take back America” by having their church literally take over their town: “Every church should run their town.” pic.twitter.com/3TXXtxsPCL
— Right Wing Watch (@RightWingWatch) March 23, 2023
Murillo and Wallnau are both ardent believers in the big lie that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump, and predictably talk of political issues and the 2024 election was prevalent during the event. At one point, Wallnau even floated the idea of organizing a traveling “Fire and Glory Tour” that would target swing states in order to break the “demonic strongholds” that are supposedly preventing Republicans from winning elections.
“There’s no Republican that can legally make it into the White House the way that the elections are set up right now,” Wallnau griped. “[The swing states] have counties that are so tightly wrapped up by the devil that it’s virtually impossible for you to see an election go through that gridwork and come out honest unless there’s a divine intervention. I just want you to know what we’re up against. But I suggested the Mario, if we do a ‘Fire and Glory Tour,’ I would want to go to every one of those swing states and I would make it a goal to break down the stronghold over each of those counties. It’s a demonic stronghold!”
In Wallnau’s view, the only “honest” elections are ones in which Republicans win, as any other result is due to a “demonic stronghold” that must be broken so that God’s preferred GOP candidates can win. And this is the message that he hopes to spread across the nation heading into the 2024 presidential election.
Wallnau and Murillo took part in a “Flashpoint Live” broadcast last year where they prayed over Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and in which participants were led in a Christian nationalist oath that asserted, “We the church are God’s governing body on the earth” and included, “We decree that we take back and permanently control positions of influence and leadership in each of the ‘Seven Mountains.’” Wallnau is a major promoter of Seven Mountains Dominionism, which holds that the right kind of Christians must take control of every sphere or “mountain” of influence in society, including government.
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