Beginning after the Civil War, members of the Protestant-led,[56] Ku Klux Klan organization began engaging in arson, beatings, cross burning, destruction of property, lynching, murder, rape, tar-and-feathering, and whipping against African Americans, Jews, Catholics, and other social or ethnic minorities.
They were explicitly Christian terrorist in ideology, basing their beliefs on a "religious foundation" in Christianity. [57] The goals of the KKK included, from an early time on, an intent to, "reestablish Protestant Christian values in America by any means possible," and believe that "Jesus was the first Klansman."[58] Their cross-burnings were conducted not only to intimidate targets, but to demonstrate their respect and reverence for Jesus Christ, and the lighting ritual was steeped in Christian symbolism, including the saying of prayers and singing of Christian hymns. [59] Many modern Klan organizations, such as the Knights Party, USA, continue to focus on the Christian supremacist message, asserting that there is a "war" on to destroy "western Christian civilization." [60]
During the twentieth century, members of extremist groups such as the Army of God began executing attacks against abortion clinics and doctors across the United States.[61][62][63] A number of terrorist attacks were attributed to individuals and groups with ties to the Christian Identity and Christian Patriot movements, including the Lambs of Christ.[64] A group called Concerned Christians were deported from Israel on suspicion of planning to attack holy sites in Jerusalem at the end of 1999, believing that their deaths would "lead them to heaven."[65][66] The motive for anti-abortionist Scott Roeder murdering Wichita doctor George Tiller on May 31, 2009 was a belief that abortion is criminal and immoral, and that this belief went "hand in hand" with his religious beliefs.[67][68] The Centennial Olympic Park bombing in 1996, as well as subsequent attacks on an abortion clinic and a lesbian nightclub, were made by Eric Robert Rudolph; Michael Barkun, a professor at Syracuse University, considers Rudolph to likely fit the definition of a Christian terrorist, whereas James A. Aho, a professor at Idaho State University, argues instead that Rudolph was inspired only in part by religious considerations.[69]
Hutaree was a Christian militia group based in Adrian, Michigan. In 2010, after an FBI agent infiltrated the group, nine of its members were indicted by a federal grand jury in Detroit on charges of seditious conspiracy to use of improvised explosive devices, teaching the use of explosive materials, and possessing a firearm during a crime of violence.[70] Terrorism scholar Aref M. Al-Khattar has listed The Covenant, The Sword, and the Arm of the Lord, Defensive Action, The Freemen Community, and some "Christian militia" as groups that "can be placed under the category of far-right-wing terrorism" that "has a religious (Christian) component".[71]
In a 2005 Congressional hearing about radicalization in U.S. prisons, Sheila Jackson Lee stated that investigators needed to analyze Christian militants in America because they might try to "bring down the country."[72]
