Texas State Representative James Talarico (D) claimed in an interview this year that Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are each different seasons of the same show, with Christianity as “the most violent.” The remark extends a string of scandalizing statements by the self-described seminarian. It is most noteworthy because it was not some past comment dredged from the depths of the internet, but it came during his current campaign for U.S. Senate, during an interview for a profile published in The New Yorker on February 23, 2026.

Referring to his campaign manager, Seth Krasne, Talarico said, “Seth and I talk about how Judaism is Season One of the show, Christianity is Season Two, and Islam is Season Three. I’m Season Two — the most violent season. My religion has done more damage to both of those religions than they’ve done to each other.”

Credit where credit is due: few politicians can pack theological errors together as concisely as Talarico. Here, Talarico sounds as if he is half-responding to subjects he half-learned. These comments serve Talarico’s political purposes nicely (denigrating Christianity and praising Islam both appeal to the Democratic base), but he would be too intelligent to defend the substance of these comments if ever forced to think below the surface.

Same Show, Different Seasons?

The first absurd claim is that Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are Seasons One, Two, and Three, implicitly of the same show. The claim suggests that these religions are fundamentally alike and therefore equal and interchangeable. At root is the progressive belief that all religions are fundamentally about keeping behavior within acceptable limits.

Such notions may pass for wisdom in a class on Comparative Religion, which “is so much a matter of degree and distance and difference that it is only comparatively successful,” quips G.K. Chesterton in “The Everlasting Man.” “We are accustomed to see the names of the great religious founders all in a row: Christ; Mahomet; Buddha; Confucius. But in truth this is only a trick. … Those religions and religious founders, or rather those whom we choose to lump together as religions and religious founders, do not really show any common character.”

Chesterton grants that “Islam did come after Christianity and was largely an imitation of Christianity,” but it does not follow that the two should be lumped together as the same.

The most glaring difference is the God they worship. Christians worship a personal, triune God; Muslims mock the notion of a trinity and maintain that Allah is so transcendent as to have no personal relationship with his creatures. Jews likewise deny the Trinity, making the Christian God fundamentally distinct than the objects of worship in either Judaism or Islam.

The identity of God is a core principle for any religious system. Fundamental differences here introduce fundamental consistencies when trying to string different religions together. Just imagine “The Office” if Dunder Mifflin was a paper company in Season One, a defense contractor in Season Two, and a tech support call center in Season Three.

Countless other doctrinal differences between Christianity, Judaism, and Islam could be described, including different understandings of salvation, holiness, revelation, and eschatology.

The one difference most relevant to highlight here is the disparate understandings of the relationship between church and state. Christianity fundamentally divides church from state as two separate realms of authority. Jesus taught, “render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s” (Matthew 22:21). Even when Roman emperors began to claim jurisdiction over Christianity in the fourth century, some Christians pushed back. “What has the emperor to do with the church?” protested the North African Bishop Donatus in AD 347. Christianity offers freedom, and so the church’s mission cannot be combined with state compulsion.

Islam, by contrast, is all about submission (as its very name means). Islam recognizes no distinction between church and state; Islamic governments are inherently religious, and they enforce submission to Islam with the power of the sword.

Christianity Is Most Violent?

This leads us to consider Talarico’s second absurd claim, that Christianity is the “most violent” of the three monotheistic religions. Talarico has in mind the Crusades, a series of campaigns undertaken by Medieval Christendom to retake political control over the Holy Land, in which Jesus lived and died.

However, there are two major flaws with judging Christianity to be the “most violent” religion because of the Crusades. The first is implied by the prefix of the word “retake.” Those who condemn Christianity for the Crusades usually stop their historical inquiry at around AD 1000. If we travelled further back in time to say, the sixth century, we would find flourishing, predominantly Christian societies in what would now be Tunisia, parts of Syria, and parts of Turkey. Christians also played significant and influential roles in Egypt, the Levant, and other Roman provinces ringing the Mediterranean.

What happened to all those communities? When Mohammed invented Islam in the early seventh century, Muslims launched a rapid campaign of conquest and forcible conversion, demolishing (not all, but many) Christian communities that had existed for centuries. The westward tide of the Muslim conquest was not stemmed until Charles Martel, grandfather of Charlemagne, defeated a Moorish raid in central France at the Battle of Tours in 732. In the east, Constantinople long impeded Islamic expansion, but after its fall in 1453 Muslim armies dominated eastern Europe for more than two centuries. The apex of Muslim expansion in the east was the 1683 siege of Vienna, which was only broken by a famous Polish cavalry charge.

Even today, Islam commits far more violence against Christianity than vice versa. From Madagascar to Congo to Sudan to Nigeria, it is Muslims killing Christians, not the other way around. Christians face systematic persecution in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, and other Muslim countries that is categorically worse than the freedom offered in countries (like the U.S.) long influenced by Christianity.

In summary, if it comes to comparing whether Muslims or Christians have invaded more of the other’s lands, Islam is by far the worse aggressor.

Yet such analysis is inadvisable due to the second major flaw in Talarico’s argument, which has to do with the difference between Islam and Christianity as religions. Islam is a political religion, so when an Islamic ruler conquers territory, it is fair to say that Islam has conquered that territory.

Christianity is fundamentally different. As Jesus explained, “My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world” (John 18:36). Recall the distinction made earlier between the Christian church and the state, which should lead us to distinguish “Christianity” (the religion of Jesus) from “Christendom” (a political and cultural arrangement with official state recognition of Christianity). Although the church can wield spiritual authority over rulers, it cannot wield political authority. Thus, when a king calls out his army and goes to war, even if he does it in the name of Christianity, it is not Christianity doing the fighting.

Consider too that Christians distinguish between deeds of the flesh and deeds of the Spirit, and they hold that every believer is locked in a lifelong conflict between his former, worldly way of life and a new, spiritual way of life. Even if a ruler is a genuine Christian, he can still act in a worldly, un-Christian way. Any worldly king can embark upon unjustified wars of conquest; therefore, such actions are worldly, not spiritual. Even if a Christian king embarks upon an unjust war in the name of Christianity, it is not Christianity doing the fighting.

Thus, to call Christianity the “most violent” religion, Talarico must 1) ignore Islam’s bloody track record; 2) dissolve distinctions between Christianity and Islam; and 3) ignore Christianity’s own self-understanding.

This analysis has largely compared Christianity and Islam, while setting aside Judaism, the third religion. The reason is that Judaism had no political power for about 1800 years after the Romans destroyed their homeland. In every place they dwelt, they were a persecuted minority just trying to survive. Thus, they do not present equal data for comparison.

But if Talarico really wants to know how much damage one religion can do to another, he should ask some Jews what they think about an Islamic mosque sitting on the site of the Jewish temple. There are no churches in Mecca, nor in fact are any public churches permitted in all of Saudi Arabia.

Thus, Talarico’s surprising claim turns out to be groundless. The religion of love that worships a crucified Messiah has actually not morphed into the bloodiest religion. In times when Christianity had only nominal influence over the actions of temporal rulers, those rulers did claim to commit deeds of violence in the name of Christianity. But such violence was no more Christian than it was pacifist. Christianity has always faced libel and slander, so why should it receive anything different now from “a Christian who hates Christianity”?