Trumpism's most telling and characteristic moments – not its most important, nor most brutal, nor most dangerous, nor most senseless, but potentially its most enlightening – came earlier this autumn. During the period of several weeks, the American president commenced revealing all observers his plans for a lavish reception room two times larger of the White House and subsequently started solo dismantling the East Wing to construct it.
He has committed acts 10,000 times as bad – the present calculation of casualties from his cuts to international aid amounts to 600,000 and increasing, and presently a study forecast his energy policies would kill another 1.3 million. Yet nothing as characteristic. No previous president would have attempted – truly, no former commander would have conceived – independently wrecking major areas of the executive mansion in order to erect a palace-inspired entertainment space, with the active collaboration of some of America's wealthiest, almost all of whom maintain dealings with federal agencies.
We went from 'the gentle will obtain the Earth' to 'the gentle will succumb of cholera'
As bewildering as it is to watch the president attempt to overturn the traditional concept of democracy and replace it with its complete opposite, there exists a significant segment within America who wouldn't consider it totally unfamiliar. That is those of us – in older age cohorts a near majority – who were raised within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have witnessed over the years as rightwing evangelical churches converted the Savior we learned about into exactly the opposite of who we understood him to be. Essentially, they turned a figure of love into a figure of hostility who endorses exactly the harshness that he condemned in the Gospel; this has happened more gradually, over decades instead of months, yet it remains disturbing in the same ways, a confusing personal impact for countless people.
A Damaging Christianity Takes Hold
Therefore allow me to outline the Jesus that I grew up with, because theoretically Jesus is the center of any Christian faith, and since the quickly increasing segment of Americans could have minimal awareness about him as they consider themselves skeptics or agnostics or spiritual independents. I raise no objection with any of these traditions, nor with different religions; yet I maintain that contain precious wisdom of significant worth in the Christian story.
It is unquestionably definitely not the narrative of a mighty king emerging; rather, an infant arrives to parents without shelter in a storage space, who are forced to hastily depart to a foreign land to escape secret police. The baby grows up in modest conditions, an employed craftsman; his message concerns compassion for others, especially for the poor – not merely emotional affection, but a concrete one, expressed by feeding and housing. Christ's response to hostility is to present the additional cheek – not as a demonstration of passive acceptance, but as a method to educate the aggressor; his approach to wrongdoing indicates that whenever someone steals your outer garment you must offer them your pullover as well.
The obvious and clear reality that the Jesus in biblical accounts calls for a kind of profound affection focused on the poor has perpetually caused Christianity rather a provocative belief system: appealing to the general public, but due to its inherent radicalness needing to be contained. In the fifties it was controlled by dilution – Protestantism was so widespread that it basically baptized the status quo.
A Battle for the Highest Among Us
Therefore I have felt heartened to see the determined opposition against Trump emerge in this past year. It has served as significant comfort to participate in developing the movement that has protested openly via continuous gatherings, and appears to have motivated electorate to turn out in large quantities in the off-year elections. We shall require to continue it, and in the same spirit, featuring US banners throughout each rally and calls to the finest aspects within national heritage.
We shall be interrogated ... how did you receive the foreigner? Did you accept these individuals and receive them or reject?
America is best defended, in other words, by relationship to the best in US heritage, exactly as the Christian faith is most protected through connection to that which renders it unique and magnificent, particularly the pattern of Jesus. In all circumstances does it mean acting as if the worst of both America and religious tradition did not happen; it signifies both modesty and faith, a combination that serious American Christians should be comfortable with.