Trumpism's most illuminating and distinctive instances – not its most significant, nor cruelest, nor most threatening, nor most senseless, but potentially its most enlightening – occurred earlier this fall. In the course of multiple weeks, the American president began displaying all observers his intentions for an ornate dance hall two times larger of the White House and then began independently demolishing the East Wing portion to construct it.
He has committed acts ten thousand times worse – the existing assessment of fatalities from his cuts to USAID stands at 600,000 and growing, and recently research projected his energy policies would cause deaths 1.3 million more. Yet nothing as characteristic. No other president would have attempted – truly, no other president would have imagined – independently wrecking significant portions of the White House in order to erect a Versailles-style party room, with the enthusiastic participation of numerous America's wealthiest, the majority of whom have business with public institutions.
We moved from 'the humble will receive the Earth' into 'the gentle will succumb of cholera'
As confusing as it is to watch the chief executive try to upend the established notion of democracy and replace it with its polar opposite, there is one large group within America who should not find it totally unfamiliar. That is those of us – within elder demographics close to half – who were raised as conventional Protestant believers.
We have observed throughout the years as politically conservative religious groups converted the Savior we grew up with into exactly the opposite of our understanding of him. At its most basic, they transformed an image of affection into a symbol of hostility who endorses precisely the cruelties that he denounced in scripture; this change developed more gradually, across decades rather than months, but it is nonetheless unsettling via comparable methods, a bewildering emotional blow for many of us.
A Damaging Christianity Gains Ground
Therefore allow me to outline the Christ from my childhood, because theoretically Christ is the focus of Christian religion, and given that the fastest-growing cadre within America could have minimal awareness about him because they identify as atheists or doubters or spiritual independents. I raise no objection with any of these traditions, nor with alternative spiritual paths; yet I maintain that there are pearls of great price within Christian narrative.
It is decidedly definitely not the narrative of a mighty king appearing; instead, an infant arrives to displaced parents in a garage, who are forced to hastily depart to a different country to escape undercover officers. The infant develops in simple surroundings, an employed craftsman; his message is about love for fellow humans, particularly for the impoverished – and not a sentimental love, but a concrete one, demonstrated through nourishing and protecting. Christ's response to aggression is to turn the opposite cheek – not as a demonstration of compliant endurance, but as a way to instruct the assailant; his approach to wrongdoing states that when an individual takes your jacket you should give him your sweater too.
The evident and clear truth that Christ in biblical accounts requests a kind of profound affection focused on the poor is what has always made the Christian faith rather a provocative belief system: attractive to the general public, but due to its natural unconventionality requiring to be contained. In the fifties it was controlled through watering down – Protestantism was so dominant that it practically sanctified existing conditions.
A Struggle for the Best of Us
Therefore I have felt encouraged to witness the persistent defiance against Trump develop in this past year. It has served as substantial consolation to participate in developing the initiative that has taken to the streets through repeated demonstrations, and appears to have motivated citizens to turn out in large quantities in the off-year elections. We must have to maintain it, and with identical determination, featuring US banners throughout each rally and calls to the highest qualities in US history.
We shall be interrogated ... how did you receive the stranger? Did you receive him and receive them or not?
America is best defended, in other words, by reference to the highest in US heritage, exactly as the Christian faith is best defended by relationship to elements that cause it to be distinctive and magnificent, which is the example of Christ. In all circumstances does it suggest pretending the most damaging regarding America and Christian faith never occurred; it represents both modesty and conviction, a blend that genuine national faithful should be comfortable with.
