The Trump phenomenon's most revealing and characteristic moments – not its most significant, nor most harsh, nor most dangerous, nor stupidest, but possibly its most revealing – occurred earlier this fall. In the course of several weeks, the US president began displaying everyone his designs for a lavish reception room two times larger of the White House and subsequently started solo dismantling the eastern section to construct it.
He has done things 10,000 times as bad – the current estimate of deaths resulting from his reductions to international aid amounts to 600,000 and growing, and this week research projected his energy policies would cause deaths 1.3 million more. Yet nothing as characteristic. No former leader would have dared – truly, no former commander would have contemplated – unilaterally destroying large sections 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 the government.
We transitioned from 'the gentle will obtain the planet' to 'the meek shall die from cholera'
As bewildering as it is to observe the president attempt to overturn the old idea of democracy and exchange it with its direct contrary, there is one large group among Americans who might not perceive it totally unfamiliar. That encompasses people such as ourselves – in older age cohorts close to half – who were educated as mainline Protestant Christians.
We have witnessed across decades as rightwing evangelical churches turned the Jesus we learned about into the complete reverse of our understanding of him. Fundamentally, they transformed an image of love into a figure of animosity who approves precisely the cruelties that he criticized in scripture; this change developed more gradually, across decades rather than months, however it is still disturbing through similar means, a bewildering emotional blow for many of us.
A Damaging Christianity Takes Hold
So let me first describe the Christ that I grew up with, because theoretically Christ is the focus of any Christian faith, and since the rapidly expanding group of Americans might have little sense of him because they identify as skeptics or uncertain individuals or spiritual independents. I have no problem with these various perspectives, nor with alternative spiritual paths; however I believe that exist valuable insights of great price in biblical accounts.
It is emphatically definitely not the story of an authoritative monarch appearing; instead, a baby is born to displaced parents in an automotive shelter, who need to rapidly escape to a foreign land to avoid secret police. The child matures in humble circumstances, an employed craftsman; his teaching concerns compassion for other people, especially for the impoverished – and not a sentimental love, but tangible care, shown by providing food and protecting. The Savior's reaction to aggression is to present the opposite cheek – not as a demonstration of passive acceptance, but as a way to teach the attacker; his method regarding offenses is that if a person pilfers your outer garment you ought to provide them your pullover also.
The obvious and clear truth that Christ from scripture requests a type of radical love concentrated on the impoverished has perpetually caused Christianity rather a provocative belief system: appealing to the populace, but because of its natural unconventionality requiring to be restrained. In the fifties it was contained via weakening – Protestantism was so widespread that it practically baptized the status quo.
A Battle for the Highest Within Us
Hence I have become encouraged to see the persistent defiance regarding Trump develop in this past year. It has served as substantial consolation to participate in developing the initiative that has protested openly via continuous gatherings, and appears to have motivated citizens to participate in significant amounts in interim political contests. We will need to continue it, and with identical determination, with American flags during all protests and requests to the best parts in US history.
We shall be interrogated ... about how you treated the foreigner? Did you accept these individuals and welcome him or reject?
The nation is most protected, in other words, through connection to the finest in US heritage, just as Christianity is optimally secured by relationship to that which renders it special and wonderful, specifically the model of Christ. In all circumstances does it imply acting as if the most damaging about the nation and religious tradition never occurred; it means both meekness and belief, a mixture that serious US believers ought to accept.
