Thank you for this. My heart breaks over my Christian friends who still believe and support the former president. I only wish those who most need to read this would take the opportunity to look at him from this perspective.
I recall seeing a truck on our family’s way to church one day with a “Jesus Saves” bumper sticker pasted next to their “Let’s Go Brandon” bumper sticker. That represented the rot in the evangelical movement to me. We need a reformation yesterday. Thank you for turning readers to Ephesians and godly talk in our coarse Christian culture.
I hear your pain - and it makes no bit of difference. The “ Christian” community has for the most part substituted the worship of Christ for the idolatry of meanness and grievance. They worship evil because they believe that the idol they worship will protect them from the evil they see around them or perceive.
They are hypocrites, unworthy and broken in their belief and adherence to the words and commands of Jesus Christ.
As a relatively new follower of our Lord, having accepted Him just 4 years ago at age 64, I am amazed at how deep the rot goes.
How easy it was for them to discard lifetimes and generations of faith to pursue this idolatry of power and grievance. They, my Christian brothers and sisters have forsaken the red letters for the easy pursuit of moral and political righteousness - God help and forgive them
The very men who were my leaders and pastors in the early years of the Jesus Movement when I got saved have been on stage / in public supporting Trump when he was office, saying he was the man God chose to lead America.
So I ask myself, was everything they told me a lie, or did they just never really accept the lordship of Christ and instead wanted power over people in the same ways that Trump holds power over the sycophants who do obeisance to him?
I've been around for a long time too. I think there has been a slow corruption of Evangelical Christianity here in America. Anti-Abortion was a kind of gate-way issue that began the identification of Christianity with the Republican party. And then it was the gay issues which started in he late '70s <?>, Falwell etc. This layered and solidified the connections between E., Christianity and the GOP.
Add to this this narrative of victimization. This false narrative of political and religious victimization was fuelled by folk like Rush Limbaugh and well as folks from within the Evangelical movement.
And there is always the fact that whenever the Church obtains political or Cultural/social power, it has always led to the the church becoming a source of coercion and persecution. That's what we are seeing here. SBC and other evangelicals had a perception of social/political power, which they've been losing the last few decade [the gays etc], and they are they are kind of freaking out.
Lots of reasons for a slow corruption that has finally inverted everything we used to believe.
I surely get this. I am sitting with Pascal’s wager on this. I truly don’t want to be identified as anything or anyone that supports DJT, the NRA or legislating for us to become a theocracy.
Very well said indeed, sir. I just read the "fixed" version of the article, and I commend you for how quickly and well you responded and implemented the edits. It was a seamless read to me. This editorial/article/post sets out very much how I've felt since 2016, when Trump took the nomination in the first place. COVID was just another set up for shock and revulsion at how so many of my brothers and sisters in Christ responded to the unequivocal need to adjust our behavior to protect vulnerable people.
I am no longer a Christian in a large part due to Christianities treatment of LGBT people. As a Unitarian Universalist I feel I live my life avoiding all the traits you say the Bible ascribes to non-christians. Although I think you probably didn't mean to charge all non-christians with these bad attributes it seems to read that way. I agree with the rest of your piece and hope it will have a positive effect.
As an atheist, I appreciate that you made this edit. I may not be a practicing Christian, but I try to live my life in accordance with the positive values that you quoted.
I am also a Unitarian Universalist and no longer a Christian, having previously belonged to PCUSA and American Baptist denominations, which I still admire and respect in many ways. But I am still a follower of the teachings of Jesus, as embodied in the Gospels and especially the Sermon on the Mount. I also am guided by many Jewish and Muslim principles, as well as Buddhism and other eastern philosophies and religions. For the most part, I am now at peace with my faith.
If these were the only pieces you ever wrote. They will echo in time. I lost sleep the night of his election and was against him before he came down the escalator. I am pulled to his denying his dismissive, the end sacrifices all means behavior. It would be easier too right? If I accept him, no more estrangement from family and friends, no more second guessing ethical actions, no more need to understand those different then I. In truth, it would be so much easier to accept how much like him I am and want to be. How many countless people do I know found church through Trump. The sense of community and power is enticing. I want that feeling he gives me. So why don't I just give in....and this is coming from somebody that door knocked for Biden in Iowa in complete desperation. What you write about. Above all other things, is my central concern for the past 8 years and my central turmoil. For those that think about The Word, The Story, The Fruit everyday. It is a most complex and deeply troubling thing.
I have long found it anomalous that there are people who loudly profess to be Christian who clearly do not believe in the teachings of Jesus. They loudly display the 10 Commandments but fail every last test set out in Matthew 25:40-45. Like Donald Trump they do not share with the hungry, the thirsty, the unclothed, the imprisoned or the stranger. They might throw them some paper towels. They will do nothing for the least among us. The example of how you can be someone who values these teachings and still go into public life without losing these values is Canada's great Tommy Douglas, not Donald Trump who Douglas would have excoriated for his politics.
Thank you thank you for writing this. I’m a practicing Buddhist but I’m struck by how similar the teachings are when I read your Galatians quote. There’s like a 98% overlap there. Christians who support Trump have to ask themselves which master they serve because as we all know you can only support one.
One comment: please don’t use “what a non-Christian looks like” UNLESS you qualify it to mean something like “what someone who themselves a Christian, but then supports Donald Trump looks like”... or something like that otherwise, it looks like everyone who is not a member of the Christian faith falls under the negatives that you were talking about.
I understand this was not your intent. I did not take it to be that, but that is how it can be read.
I broke with the Republican Party around 2006 thanks to attending a church that seriously challenged my culture-based theology. My primary guiding question is, “What DID Jesus do?” The answers to that are what people who claim to be His should imitate. Keep up the good work!
Thank you for your candour and humility in this essay. As one massively sympathetic with your views, I am mostly deeply saddened by the lack of civil debate and civic engagement in our country. I hope your frank yet somehow optimistic voice can help to change that.
You speak to my heart, fellow sojourner. I chase after Christ, like you, because He speaks to my heart and yours. I don’t call myself a Christian, because I am far less than He, but I am slowly working to get there. I am encouraged by your words, knowing I am not alone, in my thinking.
My gosh, every time I open the Bible and read the Holy Spirt is reveling something new to me. {Luke 12:49-56} . Sad but we will have to choose Jesus or our families and friends. I have lost friends and family shun me because I uncompromising tell them what you just wrote about. The Sheep and Goats are my north star. {Matthew 25:31-46} . The goats thought they were saved. But they lacked the love for others that Jesus commanded us to have. Their lives and actions reveled what was in their hearts. That should frighten any believer to frequently reexamine themselves.
Thank you for this. My heart breaks over my Christian friends who still believe and support the former president. I only wish those who most need to read this would take the opportunity to look at him from this perspective.
I recall seeing a truck on our family’s way to church one day with a “Jesus Saves” bumper sticker pasted next to their “Let’s Go Brandon” bumper sticker. That represented the rot in the evangelical movement to me. We need a reformation yesterday. Thank you for turning readers to Ephesians and godly talk in our coarse Christian culture.
I hear your pain - and it makes no bit of difference. The “ Christian” community has for the most part substituted the worship of Christ for the idolatry of meanness and grievance. They worship evil because they believe that the idol they worship will protect them from the evil they see around them or perceive.
They are hypocrites, unworthy and broken in their belief and adherence to the words and commands of Jesus Christ.
As a relatively new follower of our Lord, having accepted Him just 4 years ago at age 64, I am amazed at how deep the rot goes.
How easy it was for them to discard lifetimes and generations of faith to pursue this idolatry of power and grievance. They, my Christian brothers and sisters have forsaken the red letters for the easy pursuit of moral and political righteousness - God help and forgive them
So much this.
The very men who were my leaders and pastors in the early years of the Jesus Movement when I got saved have been on stage / in public supporting Trump when he was office, saying he was the man God chose to lead America.
So I ask myself, was everything they told me a lie, or did they just never really accept the lordship of Christ and instead wanted power over people in the same ways that Trump holds power over the sycophants who do obeisance to him?
I've been around for a long time too. I think there has been a slow corruption of Evangelical Christianity here in America. Anti-Abortion was a kind of gate-way issue that began the identification of Christianity with the Republican party. And then it was the gay issues which started in he late '70s <?>, Falwell etc. This layered and solidified the connections between E., Christianity and the GOP.
Add to this this narrative of victimization. This false narrative of political and religious victimization was fuelled by folk like Rush Limbaugh and well as folks from within the Evangelical movement.
And there is always the fact that whenever the Church obtains political or Cultural/social power, it has always led to the the church becoming a source of coercion and persecution. That's what we are seeing here. SBC and other evangelicals had a perception of social/political power, which they've been losing the last few decade [the gays etc], and they are they are kind of freaking out.
Lots of reasons for a slow corruption that has finally inverted everything we used to believe.
Right Wing Christians are exhibit A of why I am no longer a Christian.
I surely get this. I am sitting with Pascal’s wager on this. I truly don’t want to be identified as anything or anyone that supports DJT, the NRA or legislating for us to become a theocracy.
Very well said indeed, sir. I just read the "fixed" version of the article, and I commend you for how quickly and well you responded and implemented the edits. It was a seamless read to me. This editorial/article/post sets out very much how I've felt since 2016, when Trump took the nomination in the first place. COVID was just another set up for shock and revulsion at how so many of my brothers and sisters in Christ responded to the unequivocal need to adjust our behavior to protect vulnerable people.
Thank you.
I am no longer a Christian in a large part due to Christianities treatment of LGBT people. As a Unitarian Universalist I feel I live my life avoiding all the traits you say the Bible ascribes to non-christians. Although I think you probably didn't mean to charge all non-christians with these bad attributes it seems to read that way. I agree with the rest of your piece and hope it will have a positive effect.
You are ABSOLUTELY right, and I edited the article to reflect the error of my original verbiage.
Thank you!!
As an atheist, I appreciate that you made this edit. I may not be a practicing Christian, but I try to live my life in accordance with the positive values that you quoted.
I am also a Unitarian Universalist and no longer a Christian, having previously belonged to PCUSA and American Baptist denominations, which I still admire and respect in many ways. But I am still a follower of the teachings of Jesus, as embodied in the Gospels and especially the Sermon on the Mount. I also am guided by many Jewish and Muslim principles, as well as Buddhism and other eastern philosophies and religions. For the most part, I am now at peace with my faith.
If these were the only pieces you ever wrote. They will echo in time. I lost sleep the night of his election and was against him before he came down the escalator. I am pulled to his denying his dismissive, the end sacrifices all means behavior. It would be easier too right? If I accept him, no more estrangement from family and friends, no more second guessing ethical actions, no more need to understand those different then I. In truth, it would be so much easier to accept how much like him I am and want to be. How many countless people do I know found church through Trump. The sense of community and power is enticing. I want that feeling he gives me. So why don't I just give in....and this is coming from somebody that door knocked for Biden in Iowa in complete desperation. What you write about. Above all other things, is my central concern for the past 8 years and my central turmoil. For those that think about The Word, The Story, The Fruit everyday. It is a most complex and deeply troubling thing.
I have long found it anomalous that there are people who loudly profess to be Christian who clearly do not believe in the teachings of Jesus. They loudly display the 10 Commandments but fail every last test set out in Matthew 25:40-45. Like Donald Trump they do not share with the hungry, the thirsty, the unclothed, the imprisoned or the stranger. They might throw them some paper towels. They will do nothing for the least among us. The example of how you can be someone who values these teachings and still go into public life without losing these values is Canada's great Tommy Douglas, not Donald Trump who Douglas would have excoriated for his politics.
Thank you thank you for writing this. I’m a practicing Buddhist but I’m struck by how similar the teachings are when I read your Galatians quote. There’s like a 98% overlap there. Christians who support Trump have to ask themselves which master they serve because as we all know you can only support one.
One comment: please don’t use “what a non-Christian looks like” UNLESS you qualify it to mean something like “what someone who themselves a Christian, but then supports Donald Trump looks like”... or something like that otherwise, it looks like everyone who is not a member of the Christian faith falls under the negatives that you were talking about.
I understand this was not your intent. I did not take it to be that, but that is how it can be read.
You are ABSOLUTELY right, and I edited the article to reflect the error of my original verbiage.
Thank you!!
I broke with the Republican Party around 2006 thanks to attending a church that seriously challenged my culture-based theology. My primary guiding question is, “What DID Jesus do?” The answers to that are what people who claim to be His should imitate. Keep up the good work!
Thank you for your candour and humility in this essay. As one massively sympathetic with your views, I am mostly deeply saddened by the lack of civil debate and civic engagement in our country. I hope your frank yet somehow optimistic voice can help to change that.
What does it a profit a man to gain the whole world but lose his soul?
Well, according to Trumps base, at least you've gained the whole world.
You speak to my heart, fellow sojourner. I chase after Christ, like you, because He speaks to my heart and yours. I don’t call myself a Christian, because I am far less than He, but I am slowly working to get there. I am encouraged by your words, knowing I am not alone, in my thinking.
My gosh, every time I open the Bible and read the Holy Spirt is reveling something new to me. {Luke 12:49-56} . Sad but we will have to choose Jesus or our families and friends. I have lost friends and family shun me because I uncompromising tell them what you just wrote about. The Sheep and Goats are my north star. {Matthew 25:31-46} . The goats thought they were saved. But they lacked the love for others that Jesus commanded us to have. Their lives and actions reveled what was in their hearts. That should frighten any believer to frequently reexamine themselves.
This is tremendous - a call... a plea... for repentance.