Trumpism's most illuminating and defining moments – not its most significant, nor cruelest, nor most hazardous, nor stupidest, but perhaps its most illuminating – occurred earlier this fall. In the course of several weeks, the American president commenced revealing the public his designs for a lavish reception room twice the size of the White House and subsequently started independently demolishing the East Wing to erect it.
He has performed deeds countless times more severe – the current estimate of deaths from his cuts to USAID is 600,000 and growing, and this week a study forecast his petroleum strategies would cause deaths an additional 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No other president would have risked – genuinely, no previous leader would have conceived – unilaterally destroying major areas of the White House in order to erect a palace-inspired entertainment space, with the direct cooperation of multiple America's wealthiest, almost all of whom have business with the government.
We moved from 'the humble will receive the world' to 'the humble will perish from cholera'
As bewildering as it is to watch the chief executive try to upend the old idea about democracy and substitute it with its direct contrary, there remains a substantial portion within America who wouldn't consider it entirely new. This includes individuals like us – within elder demographics a near majority – who were raised as conventional Protestant believers.
We have watched throughout the years as rightwing evangelical churches turned the Jesus we learned about into exactly the opposite of who we understood him to be. Essentially, they turned a figure of love into a symbol of animosity who approves precisely the cruelties that he condemned in biblical teachings; this has happened more gradually, across decades as opposed to months, however it is still unsettling via comparable methods, a disorienting gut punch for many of us.
A Damaging Christianity Establishes Itself
So let me first describe the Jesus from my upbringing, since in theory Christ is the focus of any Christian faith, and given that the fastest-growing cadre among Americans could have minimal awareness regarding him as they consider themselves non-believers or doubters or nones. I take no issue with any of these traditions, nor with different religions; yet I maintain that there are pearls of great price in biblical accounts.
It is unquestionably not the story of an authoritative monarch emerging; conversely, a baby is born to displaced parents in a garage, who are forced to hastily depart to another nation to escape undercover officers. The infant develops in modest conditions, a working carpenter; his teaching concerns compassion for fellow humans, particularly for the poor – and not a sentimental love, but tangible care, shown by providing food and housing. Christ's response to hostility is to turn the opposite cheek – not as a demonstration of submissive tolerance, but as a way to teach the attacker; his crime policy states that when someone steals your jacket you must offer them your pullover also.
The evident and direct truth that Christ of the gospels calls for a form of profound affection focused on the poor has consistently rendered the Christian faith rather a controversial faith: appealing to the general public, but owing to its natural unconventionality needing to be controlled. In the 1950s it was controlled through watering down – Protestantism was so widespread that it practically blessed current circumstances.
A Struggle for the Finest Within Us
So I have been inspired to see the determined opposition regarding Trump arise during the previous year. It has been substantial consolation to assist in constructing the initiative that has protested openly through repeated demonstrations, and seems to have inspired electorate to participate in large quantities during minor elections. We must have to continue it, and through comparable resolve, featuring US banners throughout each rally and appeals to the highest qualities in US history.
We will be questioned ... regarding how you welcomed the stranger? Did you receive him and receive them or not?
America is best defended, essentially, by relationship to the highest within national tradition, similar to Christianity is best defended by relationship to what makes it distinctive and wonderful, which is the example of the Savior. In both situations does it mean pretending the most negative of both America and Christian faith was nonexistent; it represents both humility and conviction, a combination that serious American Christians should be comfortable with.
