For your edification Behind The Bastards did a two parter on how Capitalism Ate Christianity, which I'm pretty sure what happens with any faith that stays in power for too long. (On Youtube: Chapter One, Chapter Two )
This is to say it was an actual conspiracy of plutocrats to turn Christianity into the pro-America, anti-communist hyperviolent mess that Evangelical Christian nationalism is today, since the Great Depression and the New Deal pissed off the industrialists.
a means of control and of manufacturing supportive fervor. a means of generating others that you no longer have to view as human beings, and last but not least, a means of justifying vileness and violence against those you detest.
used to be kings and popes that the fervor was directed at.