The Trump movement's most revealing and defining occasions β not its most significant, nor most brutal, nor most threatening, nor stupidest, but possibly its most revealing β emerged earlier this harvest season. Over the span of multiple weeks, the American president began displaying the public his intentions for a lavish reception room double the dimensions of the White House and then commenced independently demolishing the East Wing portion to build it.
He has performed deeds ten thousand times worse β the present calculation of casualties resulting from his reductions to USAID amounts to 600,000 and growing, and presently a study predicted his energy policies would kill another 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No former leader would have attempted β truly, no other president would have imagined β independently wrecking major areas of the executive mansion to construct a Versailles-style party room, with the direct cooperation of some of America's wealthiest, nearly all of which conduct transactions with federal agencies.
We transitioned from 'the humble will receive the planet' to 'the humble will perish to cholera'
As confusing as it is to watch the president attempt to overturn the old idea regarding democracy and replace it with its polar opposite, there remains a substantial portion of Americans who might not perceive it entirely new. This includes individuals like us β within elder demographics almost a majority β who were educated within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have observed across decades while conservative evangelical congregations transformed the Christ we were raised with into exactly the opposite of our perception of his character. Fundamentally, they turned a figure of compassion into a figure of animosity who blesses precisely the cruelties that he criticized in the Gospel; this change developed more slowly, over decades rather than months, yet it remains disturbing in the same ways, a bewildering emotional blow for numerous individuals.
A Toxic Christianity Takes Hold
Hence I shall explain the Christ from my upbringing, as conceptually Christ is the focus of any Christian faith, and given that the fastest-growing cadre within America might have little sense regarding him since they are skeptics or doubters or religiously unaffiliated. I have no problem with these different approaches, nor with any other faith; but I do think that exist valuable insights of great price in biblical accounts.
It is decidedly not the account of a mighty king emerging; rather, a child comes into the world to homeless parents in a garage, who must quickly flee to another nation to escape undercover officers. The child matures in simple surroundings, a laboring woodworker; his teaching concerns compassion for other people, particularly for the poor β and not a sentimental love, but a concrete one, expressed by feeding and housing. Christ's response to violence is to turn the additional cheek β not as a gesture of compliant endurance, but as a means to instruct the assailant; his method regarding offenses states that when someone steals your jacket you must offer him your sweater too.
The obvious and straightforward fact that Christ from scripture calls for a type of extreme compassion concentrated on the needy has consistently rendered Christian religion somewhat of a scandalous religion: appealing to the general public, but because of its inherent radicalness requiring to be controlled. During the 1950s it was restrained through watering down β The Protestant faith was so widespread that it practically blessed current circumstances.
A Struggle for the Highest of Us
Therefore I have felt inspired to witness the determined opposition regarding Trump arise in this past year. It has been substantial consolation to participate in developing the movement that has taken to the streets in rally after rally, and appears to have motivated citizens to turn out in numbers during minor elections. We must have to maintain it, and through comparable resolve, displaying national flags throughout each rally and requests to the best parts in US history.
We will be questioned ... regarding how you welcomed the foreigner? Did you receive him and welcome him or reject?
America is best defended, essentially, through connection to the highest in US heritage, just as Christianity is optimally secured through connection to elements that cause it to be special and beautiful, particularly the pattern of the Savior. In neither case does it mean pretending the worst about the nation and Christianity was nonexistent; it represents both modesty and belief, a blend that genuine national faithful should embrace.
