The Trump phenomenon's most telling and defining occasions – not its most important, nor most brutal, nor most threatening, nor most foolish, but possibly its most revealing – emerged earlier this harvest season. Over the span of a few weeks, the US president started showing all observers his plans for a lavish reception room double the dimensions of the White House and then commenced solo dismantling the eastern section to erect it.
He has done things ten thousand times worse – the current estimate of deaths resulting from his reductions to foreign assistance amounts to 600,000 and growing, and this week a study predicted his energy policies would kill an additional 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No former leader would have dared – really, no previous leader would have contemplated – solo demolishing significant portions of the executive mansion in order to erect a Versailles-style party room, with the enthusiastic participation of numerous America's wealthiest, nearly all of which conduct transactions with federal agencies.
We transitioned from 'the humble will receive the world' toward 'the humble will perish of cholera'
As confusing as it is to watch the chief executive attempt to overturn the old idea about democracy and exchange it with its direct contrary, there exists a significant segment of Americans who wouldn't consider it completely novel. That is those of us – among senior generations close to half – who were educated within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have witnessed across decades as rightwing evangelical churches transformed the Christ we learned about into the total contrary of who we understood him to be. Essentially, they converted a persona of love into a figure of hostility who approves precisely the cruelties that he criticized in biblical teachings; this has happened more slowly, through multiple decades rather than months, but it is nonetheless unsettling in the same ways, a bewildering emotional blow for many of us.
A Toxic Christianity Establishes Itself
Therefore allow me to outline the Christ that I grew up with, since in theory Christ is the focus of any Christian faith, and given that the quickly increasing segment of Americans may possess limited understanding regarding him because they identify as atheists or doubters or religiously unaffiliated. I raise no objection with these different approaches, nor with any other faith; however I believe that exist valuable insights of great price in the Christian story.
It is unquestionably definitely not the story of a mighty king arising; conversely, an infant arrives to homeless parents in a storage space, who need to rapidly escape to a different country to evade secret police. The child matures in simple surroundings, an employed craftsman; his teaching concerns compassion for fellow humans, particularly for the disadvantaged – not simply tender feelings, but a concrete one, demonstrated through nourishing and housing. The Savior's reaction to hostility is to turn the opposite cheek – not as an act of passive acceptance, but as a way to teach the assailant; his approach to wrongdoing indicates that whenever a person pilfers your coat you should give him your sweater too.
The apparent and straightforward fact that the Savior from scripture advocates for a form of profound affection focused on the poor has perpetually caused the Christian faith something of a controversial faith: attractive to the general public, but due to its inherent radicalness needing to be restrained. In the fifties it was restrained via weakening – Protestantism was so widespread that it essentially baptized the status quo.
A Struggle for the Highest Within Us
So I have been inspired to witness the persistent defiance to Trump emerge during the previous year. It has served as great solace to assist in constructing the campaign that has taken to the streets via continuous gatherings, and appears to have motivated citizens to participate in large quantities during minor elections. We shall require to continue it, and with identical determination, with American flags throughout each rally and requests to the highest qualities in US history.
We shall be interrogated ... regarding how you welcomed the foreigner? Did you welcome them and receive them or reject?
America is best defended, in other words, by relationship to the best about American history, exactly as the Christian faith is optimally secured through connection to what makes it distinctive and magnificent, specifically the model of Jesus. In neither case does it mean acting as if the worst regarding America and religious tradition did not happen; it means both humility and conviction, a blend that committed American Christians should embrace.
