The Trump movement's most revealing and defining moments – not its most significant, nor most harsh, nor most hazardous, nor stupidest, but perhaps its most illuminating – emerged earlier this harvest season. Over the span of several weeks, the nation's leader commenced revealing everyone his intentions for an ornate dance hall double the dimensions than the White House and then commenced solo dismantling the East Wing portion to erect it.
He has done things ten thousand times worse – the existing assessment of casualties due to his slashing to international aid amounts to 600,000 and increasing, and recently an analysis predicted his fossil fuel policies would kill another 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No other president would have attempted – genuinely, no other president would have imagined – unilaterally destroying major areas of the White House to build a palace-inspired entertainment space, with the direct cooperation of numerous the richest Americans, almost all of whom have business with the government.
We transitioned from 'the gentle will obtain the world' toward 'the meek shall die from cholera'
As bewildering as it is to watch the chief executive try to upend the established notion about democracy and replace it with its direct contrary, there remains a substantial portion among Americans who wouldn't consider it completely novel. This includes individuals like us – in older age cohorts almost a majority – who were raised as conventional Protestant believers.
We have witnessed across decades as rightwing evangelical churches converted the Savior we were raised with into exactly the opposite of our understanding of him. Essentially, they turned a figure of love into a figure of hostility who endorses precisely the cruelties that he criticized in scripture; this change developed more slowly, over decades instead of months, but it is nonetheless disconcerting in the same ways, a disorienting gut punch for many of us.
A Damaging Christianity Establishes Itself
So let me first describe the Savior from my childhood, as conceptually Christ is the focus of any Christian faith, and given that the fastest-growing cadre of Americans might have little sense about him as they consider themselves atheists or uncertain individuals or nones. I take no issue with any of these traditions, nor with different religions; yet I maintain that there are pearls of significant worth within Christian narrative.
It is emphatically not the account of a mighty king appearing; rather, a child comes into the world to displaced parents in a garage, who must quickly flee to a different country to avoid covert authorities. The infant develops in simple surroundings, a working carpenter; his teaching focuses on affection for other people, specifically for the impoverished – not merely emotional affection, but practical compassion, shown by providing food and sheltering. Jesus' answer to hostility is to present the other cheek – not as a demonstration of submissive tolerance, but as a method to teach the assailant; his approach to wrongdoing is that if an individual takes your coat you ought to provide him your sweater as well.
The apparent and direct reality that the Jesus from scripture requests a type of radical love centered on the needy has consistently rendered Christianity rather a scandalous religion: engaging for the populace, but due to its intrinsic extremism needing to be controlled. In the 1950s it was contained through watering down – The Protestant faith was so widespread that it basically sanctified existing conditions.
A Struggle for the Highest of Us
Therefore I have felt heartened to see the persistent defiance against Trump arise in this past year. It has been significant comfort to help build the campaign that has taken to the streets in rally after rally, and likely has encouraged electorate to participate in significant amounts during minor elections. We will need to persist with it, and through comparable resolve, featuring US banners during all protests and calls to the highest qualities in US history.
We will be questioned ... regarding how you welcomed the immigrant? Did you receive him and embrace them or reject?
America is best defended, to put it differently, through connection to the finest within national tradition, similar to Christianity is most protected through connection to elements that cause it to be special and beautiful, particularly the pattern of the Savior. In both situations does it imply pretending the worst of both America and Christianity never occurred; it means both humility and conviction, a combination that serious American Christians should embrace.
