The Trump movement's most revealing and distinctive moments – not its most significant, nor most brutal, nor most threatening, nor most foolish, but perhaps its most illuminating – emerged earlier this harvest season. In the course of multiple weeks, the nation's leader began displaying all observers his plans for an ornate dance hall two times larger than the White House and subsequently started solo dismantling the East Wing portion to build it.
He has done things 10,000 times as bad – the present calculation of deaths from his cuts to USAID stands at 600,000 and growing, and recently an analysis predicted his petroleum strategies would cause deaths an additional 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No other president would have dared – genuinely, no former commander would have contemplated – unilaterally destroying large sections of the presidential residence to build a palace-inspired entertainment space, with the enthusiastic participation of numerous the nation's most affluent, nearly all of which conduct transactions with the government.
We moved from 'the meek shall inherit the Earth' into 'the meek shall die of cholera'
As bewildering as it is to witness the chief executive try to upend the traditional concept about democracy and exchange it with its direct contrary, there exists a significant segment of Americans who wouldn't consider it totally unfamiliar. That is those of us – in older age cohorts close to half – who were brought up as mainline Protestant Christians.
We have watched throughout the years as politically conservative religious groups transformed the Christ we grew up with into the total contrary of our understanding of him. Essentially, they converted a persona of love into a figure of animosity who approves specifically the brutality that he condemned in the Gospel; this has happened more slowly, over decades rather than months, but it is nonetheless disconcerting via comparable methods, a bewildering emotional blow for many of us.
A Toxic Christianity Establishes Itself
Therefore allow me to outline the Jesus from my upbringing, since in theory the Savior is the core of any Christian faith, and given that the fastest-growing cadre within America could have minimal awareness of him since they are non-believers or agnostics or spiritual independents. I have no problem with these different approaches, nor with alternative spiritual paths; yet I maintain that there are pearls of significant worth in the Christian story.
It is emphatically definitely not the account of a powerful ruler arising; rather, a baby is born to homeless parents in a garage, who must quickly flee to a different country to evade secret police. The child matures in humble circumstances, an employed craftsman; his message is about love for others, specifically for the impoverished – and not a sentimental love, but practical compassion, demonstrated through nourishing and protecting. Christ's response to aggression is to present the other cheek – not as a gesture of passive acceptance, but as a means to instruct the attacker; his method regarding offenses is that if someone steals your jacket you should give the person your additional clothing as well.
The evident and direct reality that the Jesus of the gospels calls for a type of extreme compassion centered on the poor is what has always made Christian religion something of a controversial faith: appealing to the general public, but owing to its natural unconventionality demanding to be restrained. In the 1950s it was restrained by dilution – The Protestant faith was so prevalent that it essentially blessed current circumstances.
A Struggle for the Finest Within Us
Therefore I have felt inspired to witness the steadfast resistance to Trump develop during the previous year. It has provided significant comfort to help build the initiative that has protested openly in rally after rally, and likely has encouraged electorate to show up in significant amounts in the off-year elections. We must have to persist with it, and through comparable resolve, displaying national flags during all protests and appeals to the best parts within national heritage.
We shall be interrogated ... regarding how you welcomed the foreigner? Did you accept these individuals and welcome him or not?
America is best defended, essentially, by relationship to the highest in US heritage, similar to Christianity is most protected by reference to that which renders it unique and beautiful, which is the example of Christ. In both situations does it mean acting as if the worst regarding America and religious tradition was nonexistent; it represents both modesty and faith, a blend that genuine US believers should be comfortable with.
