The Trump phenomenon's most revealing and characteristic moments – not its most crucial, nor most harsh, nor most hazardous, nor most senseless, but perhaps its most illuminating – emerged earlier this harvest season. Over the span of a few weeks, the US president started showing all observers his intentions for an ornate dance hall twice the size compared to the White House and then began solo dismantling the East Wing portion to build it.
He has committed acts ten thousand times worse – the current estimate of casualties resulting from his reductions to USAID amounts to 600,000 and rising, and recently research predicted his petroleum strategies would cause deaths an additional 1.3 million. But nothing as definitional. No other president would have risked – genuinely, no former commander would have conceived – unilaterally destroying large sections of the White House to build a palace-inspired entertainment space, with the enthusiastic participation of multiple America's wealthiest, almost all of whom have business with the government.
We moved from 'the humble will receive the world' toward 'the gentle will succumb of cholera'
As bewildering as it is to witness the president attempt to overturn the established notion of democracy and exchange it with its direct contrary, there exists a significant segment among Americans who might not perceive it entirely new. That is those of us – among senior generations almost a majority – who were educated as mainline Protestant Christians.
We have watched throughout the years as politically conservative religious groups converted the Savior we were raised with into exactly the opposite of our understanding of him. Essentially, they transformed an image of compassion into a symbol of animosity who blesses precisely the cruelties that he denounced in scripture; this has happened more gradually, over decades as opposed to months, however it is still disconcerting via comparable methods, a bewildering emotional blow for numerous individuals.
A Toxic Christianity Takes Hold
Hence I shall explain the Savior from my childhood, because theoretically the Savior is the core within Christian belief, and given that the quickly increasing segment among Americans could have minimal awareness of him since they are non-believers or doubters or nones. I have no problem with any of these traditions, nor with alternative spiritual paths; yet I maintain that there are pearls of significant worth in the Christian story.
It is decidedly not the story of a powerful ruler arising; conversely, a baby is born to homeless parents in a storage space, who need to rapidly escape to a foreign land to avoid undercover officers. The infant develops in humble circumstances, an employed craftsman; his teaching focuses on affection for fellow humans, particularly for the poor – and not a sentimental love, but tangible care, expressed by feeding and housing. The Savior's reaction to aggression is to present the other cheek – not as an act of passive acceptance, but as a means to instruct the aggressor; his approach to wrongdoing states that when someone steals your coat you must offer him your sweater also.
The apparent and straightforward reality that Christ in biblical accounts advocates for a type of extreme compassion centered on the poor has perpetually caused Christian religion somewhat of a controversial faith: appealing to the general public, but owing to its natural unconventionality requiring to be contained. In the fifties it was contained via weakening – Protestantism was so widespread that it basically baptized the status quo.
A Struggle for the Highest of Us
Hence I have become encouraged to witness the determined opposition against Trump arise over the last twelve months. It has provided great solace to help build the movement that has taken to the streets in rally after rally, and likely has encouraged voters to participate in large quantities in the off-year elections. We shall require to continue it, and in the same spirit, with American flags during all protests and requests to the finest aspects within national heritage.
We're going to be asked ... about how you treated the foreigner? Did you receive him and receive them or reject?
The nation is most protected, in other words, by reference to the best about American history, exactly as the Christian faith is best defended by relationship to elements that cause it to be special and magnificent, particularly the pattern of Christ. In both situations does it suggest acting as if the worst of both America and religious tradition did not happen; it means both meekness and belief, a combination that genuine national faithful ought to accept.
