The Trump phenomenon's most revealing and characteristic moments – not its most significant, nor most harsh, nor most dangerous, nor stupidest, but perhaps its most illuminating – emerged earlier this harvest season. During the period of several weeks, the nation's leader commenced revealing all observers his intentions for an ornate dance hall double the dimensions compared to the White House and then began unilaterally ripping down the East Wing portion to erect it.
He has done things countless times more severe – the present calculation of fatalities resulting from his reductions to USAID is 600,000 and increasing, and recently research predicted his energy policies would kill an additional 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No other president would have risked – genuinely, no previous leader would have conceived – independently wrecking significant portions of the presidential residence in order to erect a Versailles-style party room, with the active collaboration of numerous the nation's most affluent, almost all of whom conduct transactions with federal agencies.
We went from 'the gentle will obtain the planet' toward 'the gentle will succumb to cholera'
As bewildering as it is to witness the chief executive attempt to overturn the established notion of democracy and replace it with its complete opposite, there is one large group within America who wouldn't consider it completely novel. That is those of us – among senior generations almost a majority – who were raised within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have witnessed across decades as rightwing evangelical churches transformed the Christ we were raised with into the complete reverse of who we understood him to be. Essentially, they converted a persona of love into a figure of animosity who approves specifically the brutality that he condemned in scripture; this has happened more slowly, through multiple decades as opposed to months, but it is nonetheless disconcerting in the same ways, a bewildering emotional blow for countless people.
A Toxic Christianity Takes Hold
So let me first describe the Jesus that I grew up with, because theoretically the Savior is the core of any Christian faith, and because the rapidly expanding group of Americans might have little sense regarding him since they are atheists or doubters or nones. I raise no objection with these different approaches, nor with alternative spiritual paths; however I believe that there are pearls of great price in biblical accounts.
It is decidedly definitely not the narrative of an authoritative monarch appearing; instead, a baby is born to homeless parents in an automotive shelter, who must quickly flee to a foreign land to evade undercover officers. The baby grows up in modest conditions, an employed craftsman; his message concerns compassion for others, especially for the poor – not simply tender feelings, but practical compassion, demonstrated through nourishing and protecting. Jesus' answer to aggression is to offer the additional cheek – not as a demonstration of passive acceptance, but as a means to instruct the attacker; his approach to wrongdoing states that when a person pilfers your jacket you ought to provide him your sweater as well.
The evident and clear truth that the Jesus from scripture requests a kind of extreme compassion centered on the needy has perpetually caused Christianity something of a scandalous religion: appealing to the general public, but owing to its intrinsic extremism needing to be contained. In the 1950s it was controlled through watering down – Protestantism was so prevalent that it practically blessed current circumstances.
A Conflict for the Finest Among Us
Hence I have become heartened to witness the steadfast resistance against Trump emerge over the last twelve months. It has served as significant comfort to help build the initiative that has demonstrated publicly through repeated demonstrations, and appears to have motivated citizens to turn out in numbers in interim political contests. We must have to maintain it, and with identical determination, with American flags at every demonstration and appeals to the finest aspects in US history.
We will be questioned ... how did you receive the stranger? Did you receive him and receive them or refuse?
The country is optimally secured, essentially, by reference to the best about American history, similar to Christianity is most protected through connection to what makes it distinctive and beautiful, specifically the model of Jesus. In all circumstances does it imply acting as if the worst regarding America and Christian faith was nonexistent; it represents both modesty and belief, a mixture that serious American Christians should embrace.
