The Trump phenomenon's most illuminating and defining instances β not its most significant, nor most harsh, nor most hazardous, nor most foolish, but possibly its most revealing β emerged earlier this harvest season. Over the span of several weeks, the American president began displaying everyone his intentions for a gilded ballroom two times larger compared to the White House and then began solo dismantling the East Wing to construct it.
He has performed deeds countless times more severe β the present calculation of fatalities due to his slashing to USAID amounts to 600,000 and increasing, and this week a study predicted his fossil fuel policies would kill 1.3 million more. But nothing as definitional. No previous president would have risked β truly, no previous leader would have imagined β independently wrecking large sections of the White House to construct a royal-themed celebration hall, with the enthusiastic participation of some of the nation's most affluent, the majority of whom conduct transactions with federal agencies.
We moved from 'the meek shall inherit the world' toward 'the humble will perish to cholera'
As bewildering as it is to watch the chief executive seek toι’ θ¦ the traditional concept of democracy and replace it with its complete opposite, there remains a substantial portion of Americans who should not find it entirely new. This includes individuals like us β in older age cohorts close to half β who were brought up within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have observed throughout the years as politically conservative religious groups transformed the Christ we grew up with into the complete reverse of our understanding of him. Essentially, they turned a figure of affection into a symbol of hostility who approves exactly the harshness that he denounced in biblical teachings; this has happened at a slower pace, through multiple decades instead of months, but it is nonetheless unsettling through similar means, a disorienting gut punch for countless people.
A Damaging Christianity Gains Ground
Therefore allow me to outline the Savior that I grew up with, because theoretically Christ is the focus of any Christian faith, and since the fastest-growing cadre of Americans could have minimal awareness regarding him because they identify as skeptics or doubters or nones. I take no issue with any of these traditions, nor with any other faith; but I do think that exist valuable insights of great price within Christian narrative.
It is decidedly absolutely not the story of an authoritative monarch arising; rather, an infant arrives to displaced parents in a storage space, who are forced to hastily depart to a different country to evade covert authorities. The baby grows up in humble circumstances, an employed craftsman; his teaching is about love for fellow humans, particularly for the impoverished β and not a sentimental love, but tangible care, shown by providing food and protecting. The Savior's reaction to hostility is to offer the opposite cheek β not as a gesture of compliant endurance, but as a means to teach the assailant; his approach to wrongdoing states that when a person pilfers your outer garment you must offer him your sweater too.
The obvious and clear fact that the Jesus of the gospels requests a type of extreme compassion centered on the needy has perpetually caused Christianity somewhat of a controversial faith: appealing to the masses, but because of its intrinsic extremism requiring to be controlled. During the 1950s it was controlled through watering down β Protestant Christianity was so widespread that it practically baptized the status quo.
A Struggle for the Highest Among Us
Therefore I have felt encouraged to see the determined opposition against Trump develop in this past year. It has been great solace to help build the initiative that has taken to the streets through repeated demonstrations, and likely has encouraged electorate to turn out in numbers in the off-year elections. We will need to persist with it, and in the same spirit, with American flags during all protests and requests to the finest aspects of American history.
We will be questioned ... about how you treated the immigrant? Did you welcome them and receive them or reject?
America is best defended, in other words, by relationship to the best about American history, similar to Christianity is most protected by relationship to elements that cause it to be unique and wonderful, which is the example of the Savior. In neither case does it mean acting as if the most negative regarding America and Christian faith did not happen; it signifies both meekness and conviction, a blend that committed national faithful should be comfortable with.
