The Trump phenomenon's most telling and characteristic instances – not its most significant, nor most harsh, nor most threatening, nor most senseless, but possibly its most revealing – occurred earlier this fall. In the course of multiple weeks, the US president began displaying the public his intentions for an ornate dance hall twice the size of the White House and subsequently started independently demolishing the East Wing portion to construct it.
He has performed deeds 10,000 times as bad – the current estimate of fatalities resulting from his reductions to foreign assistance stands at 600,000 and rising, and recently a study predicted his petroleum strategies would result in fatalities an additional 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No other president would have dared – really, no previous leader would have imagined – independently wrecking major areas of the White House to construct a royal-themed celebration hall, with the active collaboration of numerous the nation's most affluent, the majority of whom conduct transactions with public institutions.
We went from 'the gentle will obtain the planet' toward 'the gentle will succumb of cholera'
As disorienting as it is to witness 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 wouldn't consider it completely novel. That encompasses people such as ourselves – among senior generations almost a majority – who were brought up within mainstream Protestant traditions.
We have witnessed across decades as politically conservative religious groups converted the Savior we grew up with into exactly the opposite of who we understood him to be. At its most basic, they turned a figure of compassion into a symbol of hostility who approves exactly the harshness that he denounced in biblical teachings; this change developed more gradually, through multiple decades instead of months, however it is still disturbing via comparable methods, a confusing personal impact for countless people.
A Damaging Christianity Gains Ground
So let me first describe the Christ that I grew up with, as conceptually Christ is the focus of any Christian faith, and given that the fastest-growing cadre of Americans could have minimal awareness about him as they consider themselves non-believers or uncertain individuals or religiously unaffiliated. I take no issue with these different approaches, nor with any other faith; however I believe that there are pearls of significant worth in the Christian story.
It is decidedly absolutely not the account of a powerful ruler arising; rather, a baby is born to parents without shelter in an automotive shelter, who must quickly flee to another nation to evade secret police. The child matures in simple surroundings, a working carpenter; his doctrine is about love for others, especially for the poor – and not a sentimental love, but practical compassion, demonstrated through nourishing and housing. Christ's response to hostility is to offer the opposite cheek – not as a demonstration of compliant endurance, but as a method to instruct the attacker; his method regarding offenses states that when someone steals your outer garment you must offer the person your additional clothing as well.
The evident and straightforward truth that the Jesus of the gospels requests a form of radical love centered on the needy has perpetually caused the Christian faith something of a provocative belief system: engaging for the general public, but due to its inherent radicalness needing to be restrained. During the 1950s it was restrained by dilution – Protestantism was so prevalent that it practically baptized the status quo.
A Conflict for the Finest Within Us
Therefore I have felt encouraged to observe the steadfast resistance to Trump arise over the last twelve months. It has provided substantial consolation to participate in developing the movement that has taken to the streets through repeated demonstrations, and seems to have inspired electorate to turn out in large quantities in the off-year elections. We will need to persist with it, and through comparable resolve, displaying national flags throughout each rally and requests to the highest qualities of American history.
We shall be interrogated ... how did you receive the foreigner? Did you welcome them and receive them or not?
The country is optimally secured, essentially, through connection to the best about American history, similar to Christianity is most protected by relationship to that which renders it distinctive and wonderful, specifically the model of Jesus. In neither case does it mean feigning the worst about the nation and Christianity never occurred; it signifies both modesty and faith, a combination that committed American Christians should embrace.
