The Trump phenomenon's most telling and characteristic moments – not its most significant, nor most harsh, nor most threatening, nor stupidest, but perhaps its most illuminating – came earlier this autumn. In the course of a few weeks, the American president started showing everyone his designs for an ornate dance hall two times larger than the White House and then began unilaterally ripping down the East Wing portion to build it.
He has committed acts countless times more severe – the existing assessment of fatalities from his cuts to international aid is 600,000 and increasing, and recently an analysis forecast his fossil fuel policies would cause deaths 1.3 million more. Yet nothing as characteristic. No other president would have risked – genuinely, no former commander would have contemplated – independently wrecking large sections of the White House to build a Versailles-style party room, with the active collaboration of numerous the nation's most affluent, nearly all of which conduct transactions with public institutions.
We went from 'the gentle will obtain the Earth' toward 'the humble will perish from cholera'
As bewildering as it is to watch the leader attempt to overturn the old idea regarding democracy and substitute it with its complete opposite, there remains a substantial portion among Americans who should not find it entirely new. That is those of us – in older age cohorts close to half – who were raised within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have witnessed over the years as rightwing evangelical churches turned the Jesus we grew up with into the complete reverse of who we understood him to be. Fundamentally, they converted a persona of affection into an icon of animosity who approves specifically the brutality that he criticized in the Gospel; this has happened more slowly, over decades as opposed to months, yet it remains disconcerting through similar means, a bewildering emotional blow for many of us.
A Toxic Christianity Establishes Itself
So let me first describe the Savior from my upbringing, as conceptually the Savior is the core within Christian belief, and since the fastest-growing cadre among Americans might have little sense regarding him as they consider themselves non-believers or uncertain individuals or spiritual independents. I take no issue with these different approaches, nor with any other faith; yet I maintain that contain precious wisdom of significant worth in the Christian story.
It is decidedly definitely not the narrative of an authoritative monarch emerging; conversely, a child comes into the world to displaced parents in a garage, who need to rapidly escape to a different country to escape undercover officers. The baby grows up in humble circumstances, an employed craftsman; his message focuses on affection for fellow humans, especially for the impoverished – not simply tender feelings, but practical compassion, expressed by feeding and housing. Christ's response to aggression is to offer the other cheek – not as an act of passive acceptance, but as a method to educate the attacker; his approach to wrongdoing indicates that whenever a person pilfers your jacket you must offer him your sweater too.
The evident and direct reality that the Savior in biblical accounts calls for a type of profound affection focused on the needy has consistently rendered Christian religion something of a scandalous religion: engaging for the general public, but due to its inherent radicalness needing to be contained. In the fifties it was controlled through watering down – Protestant Christianity was so prevalent that it practically blessed current circumstances.
A Conflict for the Best Among Us
So I have been inspired to see the persistent defiance to Trump develop in this past year. It has been significant comfort to participate in developing the campaign that has taken to the streets through repeated demonstrations, and likely has encouraged citizens to turn out in significant amounts during minor elections. We shall require to persist with it, and in the same spirit, with American flags at every demonstration and appeals to the finest aspects within national heritage.
We're going to be asked ... how did you receive the foreigner? Did you accept these individuals and embrace them or reject?
America is best defended, in other words, through connection to the best in US heritage, just as Christianity is best defended through connection to that which renders it unique and magnificent, specifically the model of Jesus. In both situations does it imply acting as if the worst of both America and Christianity was nonexistent; it means both modesty and faith, a mixture that genuine American Christians ought to accept.
