The Trump movement's most illuminating and distinctive instances – not its most significant, nor most brutal, nor most hazardous, nor most foolish, but perhaps its most illuminating – emerged earlier this harvest season. Over the span of multiple weeks, the American president began displaying everyone his intentions for an ornate dance hall two times larger compared to the White House and then began independently demolishing the East Wing portion to erect it.
He has committed acts 10,000 times as bad – the current estimate of casualties due to his slashing to foreign assistance stands at 600,000 and growing, and recently an analysis projected his energy policies would cause deaths 1.3 million more. However nothing as distinctive. No other president would have attempted – genuinely, no other president would have conceived – independently wrecking large sections of the White House in order to erect a royal-themed celebration hall, with the enthusiastic participation of numerous the richest Americans, nearly all of which have business with the government.
We moved from 'the humble will receive the Earth' into 'the humble will perish from cholera'
As disorienting as it is to watch the chief executive try to upend the traditional concept regarding democracy and exchange it with its direct contrary, there exists a significant segment within America who should not find it completely novel. This includes individuals like us – within elder demographics close to half – who were educated as mainline Protestant Christians.
We have watched throughout the years while conservative evangelical congregations turned the Jesus we learned about into the complete reverse of who we understood him to be. Essentially, they transformed an image of compassion into a figure of hostility who blesses specifically the brutality that he condemned in scripture; this change developed more slowly, across decades rather than months, yet it remains unsettling in the same ways, a bewildering emotional blow for countless people.
A Harmful Christianity Takes Hold
So let me first describe the Christ from my upbringing, since in theory Christ is the focus of Christian religion, and given that the rapidly expanding group among Americans may possess limited understanding about him as they consider themselves skeptics or doubters or religiously unaffiliated. I have no problem with these various perspectives, nor with different religions; yet I maintain that contain precious wisdom of substantial value within Christian narrative.
It is decidedly not the account of an authoritative monarch emerging; conversely, an infant arrives to homeless parents in a storage space, who must quickly flee to a different country to evade covert authorities. The baby grows up in humble circumstances, an employed craftsman; his message focuses on affection for fellow humans, especially for the impoverished – not merely emotional affection, but a concrete one, expressed by feeding and protecting. The Savior's reaction to hostility is to offer the opposite cheek – not as a gesture of compliant endurance, but as a method to educate the assailant; his crime policy is that if an individual takes your jacket you must offer him your sweater as well.
The obvious and straightforward reality that Christ in biblical accounts calls for a form of profound affection concentrated on the needy has perpetually caused Christianity somewhat of a controversial faith: attractive to the populace, but owing to its natural unconventionality needing to be controlled. In the 1950s it was controlled by dilution – The Protestant faith was so widespread that it essentially baptized the status quo.
A Battle for the Highest Among Us
Therefore I have felt heartened to see the persistent defiance to Trump develop during the previous year. It has provided great solace to participate in developing the initiative that has protested openly in rally after rally, and seems to have inspired electorate to show up in significant amounts during minor elections. We must have to continue it, and in the same spirit, featuring US banners at every demonstration and appeals to the finest aspects within national heritage.
We will be questioned ... about how you treated the stranger? Did you accept these individuals and embrace them or not?
The country is optimally secured, in other words, by relationship to the best about American history, similar to Christianity is most protected by relationship to what makes it unique and beautiful, particularly the pattern of the Savior. In both situations does it imply acting as if the most negative regarding America and religious tradition did not happen; it means both humility and faith, a combination that serious American Christians should be comfortable with.
