The Trump phenomenon's most telling and distinctive moments – not its most significant, nor cruelest, nor most dangerous, nor most foolish, but potentially its most enlightening – occurred earlier this fall. In the course of a few weeks, the US president started showing everyone his designs for a lavish reception room double the dimensions of the White House and then began solo dismantling the East Wing to construct it.
He has performed deeds 10,000 times as bad – the present calculation of casualties resulting from his reductions to foreign assistance stands at 600,000 and growing, and recently a study forecast his energy policies would kill 1.3 million more. However nothing as distinctive. No previous president would have attempted – really, no former commander would have contemplated – independently wrecking large sections of the executive mansion in order to erect a royal-themed celebration hall, with the active collaboration of multiple America's wealthiest, nearly all of which conduct transactions with public institutions.
We transitioned from 'the meek shall inherit the world' to 'the meek shall die of cholera'
As bewildering as it is to watch the president try to upend the old idea about democracy and substitute it with its direct contrary, there is one large group within America who should not find it entirely new. This includes individuals like us – within elder demographics almost a majority – who were raised within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have witnessed throughout the years while conservative evangelical congregations turned the Jesus we grew up with into the total contrary of who we understood him to be. Fundamentally, they converted a persona of compassion into a symbol of hostility who approves exactly the harshness that he denounced in biblical teachings; this change developed at a slower pace, over decades as opposed to months, however it is still unsettling via comparable methods, a disorienting gut punch for many of us.
A Toxic Christianity Gains Ground
So let me first describe the Christ from my upbringing, because theoretically Christ is the focus of any Christian faith, and given that the fastest-growing cadre within America could have minimal awareness about him as they consider themselves non-believers or agnostics or religiously unaffiliated. I raise no objection with these different approaches, nor with different religions; yet I maintain that exist valuable insights of significant worth in biblical accounts.
It is unquestionably not the account of an authoritative monarch appearing; conversely, a baby is born to displaced parents in a garage, who are forced to hastily depart to a foreign land to escape covert authorities. The baby grows up in modest conditions, a laboring woodworker; his message is about love for fellow humans, specifically for the impoverished – not simply tender feelings, but a concrete one, shown by providing food and housing. The Savior's reaction to aggression is to present the other cheek – not as an act of compliant endurance, but as a method to teach the aggressor; his method regarding offenses indicates that whenever someone steals your outer garment you must offer them your pullover too.
The apparent and straightforward truth that Christ of the gospels advocates for a type of profound affection concentrated on the poor has consistently rendered Christianity rather a scandalous religion: appealing to the masses, but owing to its intrinsic extremism requiring to be controlled. In the fifties it was controlled through watering down – Protestantism was so dominant that it basically sanctified existing conditions.
A Struggle for the Best Within Us
Therefore I have felt inspired to witness the persistent defiance regarding Trump emerge during the previous year. It has provided significant comfort to participate in developing the initiative that has protested openly via continuous gatherings, and appears to have motivated citizens to participate in large quantities in the off-year elections. We must have to maintain it, and through comparable resolve, displaying national flags during all protests and calls to the finest aspects of American history.
We're going to be asked ... how did you receive the stranger? Did you welcome them and welcome him or not?
The nation is most protected, essentially, by relationship to the finest within national tradition, similar to Christianity is optimally secured by reference to elements that cause it to be distinctive and beautiful, particularly the pattern of Christ. In all circumstances does it suggest acting as if the most negative about the nation and religious tradition never occurred; it means both humility and faith, a combination that committed national faithful should embrace.
