The Trump phenomenon's most revealing and distinctive instances – not its most crucial, nor most brutal, nor most hazardous, nor most senseless, but potentially its most enlightening – emerged earlier this harvest season. During the period of several weeks, the nation's leader started showing all observers his plans for a lavish reception room twice the size compared to the White House and then began solo dismantling the East Wing portion to build it.
He has done things 10,000 times as bad – the present calculation of casualties from his cuts to USAID stands at 600,000 and rising, and recently a study predicted his energy policies would kill another 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No previous president would have attempted – really, no previous leader would have contemplated – unilaterally destroying significant portions of the White House to construct a royal-themed celebration hall, with the direct cooperation of numerous the nation's most affluent, the majority of whom maintain dealings with the government.
We went from 'the gentle will obtain the planet' into 'the humble will perish from cholera'
As bewildering as it is to observe the president try to upend the traditional concept of democracy and substitute it with its complete opposite, there exists a significant segment among Americans who should not find it completely novel. That is those of us – in older age cohorts almost a majority – who were brought up as mainline Protestant Christians.
We have watched across decades as politically conservative religious groups converted the Savior we learned about into exactly the opposite of who we understood him to be. At its most basic, they transformed an image of love into an icon of hate who approves exactly the harshness that he condemned in the Gospel; this transformation occurred more slowly, through multiple decades rather than months, yet it remains disturbing in the same ways, a confusing personal impact for many of us.
A Toxic Christianity Gains Ground
So let me first describe the Savior that I grew up with, since in theory Jesus is the center of any Christian faith, and because the rapidly expanding group among Americans could have minimal awareness about him as they consider themselves skeptics or uncertain individuals or religiously unaffiliated. I have no problem with these various perspectives, nor with any other faith; but I do think that contain precious wisdom of great price in biblical accounts.
It is unquestionably not the narrative of a mighty king appearing; rather, a baby is born to homeless parents in a garage, who must quickly flee to another nation to escape undercover officers. The baby grows up in simple surroundings, a laboring woodworker; his teaching focuses on affection for fellow humans, especially for the disadvantaged – not simply tender feelings, but a concrete one, shown by providing food and housing. Christ's response to hostility is to present the other cheek – not as an act of passive acceptance, but as a method to instruct the attacker; his crime policy indicates that whenever an individual takes your coat you ought to provide them your pullover also.
The obvious and clear reality that Christ in biblical accounts advocates for a form of extreme compassion concentrated on the needy is what has always made Christianity somewhat of a controversial faith: attractive to the general public, but owing to its natural unconventionality demanding to be restrained. During the 1950s it was controlled by dilution – The Protestant faith was so prevalent that it practically blessed current circumstances.
A Conflict for the Best Among Us
Therefore I have felt heartened to observe the persistent defiance to Trump emerge over the last twelve months. It has served as substantial consolation to assist in constructing the campaign that has demonstrated publicly through repeated demonstrations, and seems to have inspired citizens to turn out in significant amounts in interim political contests. We will need to continue it, and through comparable resolve, with American flags throughout each rally and appeals to the finest aspects in US history.
We will be questioned ... how did you receive the stranger? Did you receive him and embrace them or refuse?
The country is optimally secured, in other words, by relationship to the best about American history, similar to Christianity is most protected through connection to what makes it special and magnificent, specifically the model of Jesus. In neither case does it imply feigning the most damaging about the nation and religious tradition did not happen; it means both meekness and belief, a combination that genuine national faithful should embrace.
