Why Christians rush to label Kirk a martyr

Many right-wing leaders share his conviction that their politics represent the future of the United States.

- DIANE WINSTON GUEST CONTRIBUTOR

A MEMORIAL for Charlie Kirk at the Turning Point USA headquarters in Phoenix attracted supporters on Friday.

FOLLOWING YET another shooting at a U.S. college campus, Thursday morning’s class on American religious history at USC called for a different focus.

Rather than lecture my students on Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism who was killed by an angry mob, I asked students their thoughts on a newly emerging martyr filling online newsfeeds.

Charlie Kirk, the right-wing evangelical and political activist who led a youth movement he thought would help restore Christian morality in America, had just been killed the day before, shot at long range across a field at Utah Valley University by a gunman who was at that point still on the run. Almost everyone had something to say.

One student spoke about a family member who was on site in Utah where the shooting occurred. Another heard Kirk when he visited USC last spring. Still another had followed Kirk’s Turning Point USA crusade for years. All said that their social media had “blown up” with videos of the shooting and unhinged rants from both the left and the right.

Most of the students were upset and confused. They wanted time to reflect on the ramifications of Kirk's death and understand how quickly dangerous rhetoric and senseless violence can spread. No one was ready to make the same leap of faith many conservatives already had: They weren't willing to label Kirk a Christian martyr. Most wouldn’t even know what a 21st century evangelical martyr would look like.