The Trump phenomenon's most telling and distinctive moments – not its most crucial, nor most harsh, nor most threatening, nor most foolish, but potentially its most enlightening – came earlier this autumn. Over the span of several weeks, the nation's leader started showing the public his designs for a gilded ballroom two times larger of the White House and subsequently started unilaterally ripping down the East Wing portion to build it.
He has performed deeds countless times more severe – the present calculation of fatalities resulting from his reductions to foreign assistance stands at 600,000 and increasing, and recently research projected his energy policies would cause deaths an additional 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No other president would have risked – genuinely, no previous leader would have imagined – solo demolishing major areas of the executive mansion to construct a palace-inspired entertainment space, with the active collaboration of multiple the richest Americans, almost all of whom have business with the government.
We went from 'the gentle will obtain the Earth' into 'the meek shall die to cholera'
As confusing as it is to watch the president try to upend the old idea of democracy and substitute it with its direct contrary, there is one large group of Americans who might not perceive it totally unfamiliar. This includes individuals like us – among senior generations a near majority – who were raised within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have observed over the years while conservative evangelical congregations transformed the Christ we were raised with into the total contrary of who we understood him to be. At its most basic, they turned a figure of affection into an icon of hate who endorses specifically the brutality that he condemned in biblical teachings; this transformation occurred more slowly, through multiple decades rather than months, but it is nonetheless unsettling in the same ways, a disorienting gut punch for many of us.
A Damaging Christianity Takes Hold
So let me first describe the Christ from my childhood, as conceptually Christ is the focus within Christian belief, and because the fastest-growing cadre within America could have minimal awareness of him as they consider themselves non-believers or uncertain individuals or spiritual independents. I have no problem with these various perspectives, nor with any other faith; yet I maintain that contain precious wisdom of significant worth within Christian narrative.
It is emphatically definitely not the story of a powerful ruler arising; conversely, a child comes into the world to displaced parents in a storage space, who must quickly flee to a different country to evade secret police. The baby grows up in modest conditions, an employed craftsman; his message focuses on affection for fellow humans, specifically for the poor – not merely emotional affection, but practical compassion, demonstrated through nourishing and sheltering. The Savior's reaction to violence is to turn the additional cheek – not as an act of submissive tolerance, but as a method to teach the aggressor; his crime policy is that if an individual takes your jacket you should give him your sweater also.
The apparent and direct reality that Christ of the gospels calls for a kind of extreme compassion centered on the needy has consistently rendered Christianity somewhat of a provocative belief system: attractive to the general public, but due to its intrinsic extremism demanding to be controlled. In the 1950s it was controlled through watering down – Protestantism was so widespread that it basically sanctified existing conditions.
A Conflict for the Highest of Us
Hence I have become encouraged to see the determined opposition regarding Trump emerge over the last twelve months. It has been significant comfort to participate in developing the movement that has protested openly through repeated demonstrations, and appears to have motivated citizens to show up in large quantities in the off-year elections. We will need to continue it, and with identical determination, displaying national flags at every demonstration and calls to the finest aspects of American history.
We shall be interrogated ... regarding how you welcomed the foreigner? Did you welcome them and receive them or refuse?
The nation is most protected, essentially, by reference to the highest in US heritage, exactly as the Christian faith is optimally secured through connection to what makes it unique and beautiful, specifically the model of Jesus. In both situations does it mean pretending the most damaging about the nation and Christian faith did not happen; it signifies both humility and belief, a combination that committed American Christians should embrace.
