Medieval Christianity seeded the modern fusion of whiteness and faith

Evidence

The identification of light skin with Christianity is found through the centuries in tales of Muslim monsters and monstrous births that follow the medieval formula of conversion and healing, the restoration of humanity to the true believer. For medieval Christians, there was no community of “white people,” per se, even though foreigners were often represented with dark skin. Certainly, “race” as I am speaking of here is not constructed or politicized in the medieval mind in the same way as we find it in the modern imaginaire. However, in the Middle Ages we see the foundations of the ways in which “whiteness,” race, and Christianity become connected over time. — Sophia Rose Arjana, Muslims in the Western Imagination, 111

Categorization

• QUESTION: Where exactly does the author trace the pivot from medieval proto-race to modern politicized ‘whiteness’? Worth chasing in later chapters.
• SEED: This is the seed of a long essay: genealogy of ‘whiteness’ as a theological artifact, from Cursor Mundi to modern white Christian nationalism.
• XREF: connects to: Theology justified slavery and genocide by marking whiteness as Christian — Andrew L. Whitehead, American Idolatry, 145; White Christianity’s present racism is the predictable product of its history — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long: The Legacy of White…, 549; Doctrines like biblical inerrancy may have evolved partly to reinforce white dominance — Robert P. Jones, White Too Long: The Legacy of White…, 209 (+3 more)