Trumpism's most revealing and defining instances – not its most crucial, nor most harsh, nor most threatening, nor most senseless, but possibly its most revealing – occurred earlier this fall. In the course of several weeks, the American president started showing the public his plans for a lavish reception room twice the size than the White House and subsequently started solo dismantling the East Wing to erect it.
He has performed deeds countless times more severe – the existing assessment of fatalities due to his slashing to international aid is 600,000 and increasing, and this week research projected his petroleum strategies would result in fatalities another 1.3 million. Yet nothing as characteristic. No previous president would have dared – truly, no previous leader would have contemplated – solo demolishing significant portions of the executive mansion to build a royal-themed celebration hall, with the enthusiastic participation of multiple America's wealthiest, almost all of whom conduct transactions with federal agencies.
We moved from 'the meek shall inherit the Earth' toward 'the meek shall die from cholera'
As disorienting as it is to observe the leader try to upend the traditional concept of democracy and exchange it with its complete opposite, there exists a significant segment of Americans who should not find it totally unfamiliar. That is those of us – within elder demographics a near majority – who were educated as mainline Protestant Christians.
We have watched over the years as rightwing evangelical churches transformed the Christ we grew up with into the complete reverse of who we understood him to be. Fundamentally, they transformed an image of compassion into an icon of hostility who blesses precisely the cruelties that he criticized in scripture; this change developed more slowly, through multiple decades instead of months, yet it remains disconcerting in the same ways, a bewildering emotional blow for countless people.
A Damaging Christianity Takes Hold
So let me first describe the Christ that I grew up with, as conceptually the Savior is the core of Christian religion, and given that the quickly increasing segment within America may possess limited understanding regarding him because they identify as non-believers or doubters or religiously unaffiliated. I raise no objection with these various perspectives, nor with alternative spiritual paths; however I believe that contain precious wisdom of substantial value in the Christian story.
It is emphatically absolutely not the account of an authoritative monarch arising; conversely, a baby is born to displaced parents in an automotive shelter, who are forced to hastily depart to a foreign land to escape undercover officers. The infant develops in simple surroundings, an employed craftsman; his message focuses on affection for other people, particularly for the impoverished – not simply tender feelings, but tangible care, shown by providing food and housing. Christ's response to aggression is to turn the additional cheek – not as a gesture of passive acceptance, but as a method to teach the assailant; his crime policy is that if someone steals your jacket you ought to provide the person your additional clothing also.
The apparent and direct reality that the Jesus in biblical accounts calls for a form of radical love concentrated on the needy has perpetually caused the Christian faith rather a provocative belief system: engaging for the masses, but due to its inherent radicalness requiring to be contained. During the 1950s it was restrained via weakening – Protestant Christianity was so prevalent that it practically baptized the status quo.
A Battle for the Highest of Us
Hence I have become heartened to witness the persistent defiance against Trump arise in this past year. It has been significant comfort to participate in developing the initiative that has protested openly via continuous gatherings, and likely has encouraged voters to participate in numbers in the off-year elections. We must have to persist with it, and through comparable resolve, with American flags during all protests and appeals to the highest qualities in US history.
We're going to be asked ... about how you treated the immigrant? Did you accept these individuals and welcome him or refuse?
America is best defended, in other words, by reference to the best about American history, exactly as the Christian faith is most protected by relationship to elements that cause it to be distinctive and wonderful, particularly the pattern of the Savior. In neither case does it suggest pretending the most damaging about the nation and religious tradition never occurred; it represents both modesty and faith, a blend that committed national faithful ought to accept.
