The Trump phenomenon's most telling and distinctive moments – not its most crucial, nor most harsh, nor most threatening, nor most foolish, but perhaps its most illuminating – occurred earlier this fall. Over the span of multiple weeks, the American president commenced revealing all observers his designs for an ornate dance hall two times larger compared to the White House and subsequently started solo dismantling the East Wing portion to erect it.
He has done things ten thousand times worse – the present calculation of deaths due to his slashing to foreign assistance amounts to 600,000 and growing, and this week research predicted his energy policies would cause deaths an additional 1.3 million. Yet nothing as characteristic. No previous president would have attempted – really, no former commander would have conceived – unilaterally destroying major areas of the executive mansion to build a palace-inspired entertainment space, with the direct cooperation of numerous the richest Americans, the majority of whom have business with the government.
We went from 'the humble will receive the world' into 'the humble will perish from cholera'
As disorienting as it is to witness the president attempt to overturn the established notion of democracy and replace it with its polar opposite, there remains a substantial portion of Americans who should not find it entirely new. This includes individuals like us – within elder demographics almost a majority – who were raised as conventional Protestant believers.
We have watched across decades as politically conservative religious groups transformed the Christ we learned about into exactly the opposite of our perception of his character. Essentially, they turned a figure of compassion into a symbol of animosity who approves precisely the cruelties that he condemned in scripture; this change developed more gradually, over decades rather than months, but it is nonetheless disturbing in the same ways, a disorienting gut punch for countless people.
A Harmful Christianity Gains Ground
So let me first describe the Jesus that I grew up with, because theoretically the Savior is the core within Christian belief, and given that the fastest-growing cadre of Americans may possess limited understanding about him because they identify as skeptics or agnostics or spiritual independents. I take no issue with these various perspectives, nor with alternative spiritual paths; yet I maintain that exist valuable insights of significant worth in biblical accounts.
It is emphatically definitely not the story of a mighty king appearing; rather, an infant arrives to displaced parents in a storage space, who are forced to hastily depart to another nation to evade covert authorities. The baby grows up in simple surroundings, a laboring woodworker; his message concerns compassion for fellow humans, specifically for the disadvantaged – and not a sentimental love, but a concrete one, shown by providing food and sheltering. Jesus' answer to hostility is to present the other cheek – not as a demonstration of passive acceptance, but as a way to teach the aggressor; his method regarding offenses is that if a person pilfers your outer garment you must offer them your pullover as well.
The obvious and clear reality that Christ from scripture calls for a kind of radical love focused on the impoverished is what has always made Christianity somewhat of a provocative belief system: attractive to the masses, but owing to its inherent radicalness requiring to be controlled. In the 1950s it was controlled via weakening – The Protestant faith was so prevalent that it basically baptized the status quo.
A Battle for the Finest Among Us
Therefore I have felt heartened to witness the steadfast resistance regarding Trump develop in this past year. It has served as great solace to participate in developing the initiative that has protested openly in rally after rally, and appears to have motivated citizens to turn out in numbers during minor elections. We shall require to persist with it, and with identical determination, with American flags during all protests and calls to the finest aspects in US history.
We will be questioned ... about how you treated the immigrant? Did you receive him and embrace them or reject?
The country is optimally secured, essentially, through connection to the highest about American history, just as Christianity is most protected by relationship to that which renders it unique and beautiful, which is the example of Christ. In both situations does it imply acting as if the most negative of both America and Christianity never occurred; it means both humility and belief, a combination that serious American Christians should be comfortable with.
