Trump’s wrecking-ball approach to America has a precedent: the evangelical perversion of Jesus’s message of radical love to one of hate and aggression

Trumpism’s most revealing and defining moments – not its most important, nor cruelest, nor most dangerous, nor stupidest, but perhaps its most illuminating – came earlier this autumn. In the course of a few weeks, the US president started showing everyone his plans for a gilded ballroom twice the size of the White House and then began unilaterally ripping down the East Wing to build it. Then, after nationwide protests against his rule, he posted on social media an AI video of himself wearing a crown and piloting a fighter jet labeled “King Trump”, which proceeded to bomb American cities and Americans with a graphically vivid load of human poop.

As disorienting as it is to watch the president try to upend the old idea of democracy and replace it with its polar opposite, there is one large group of Americans who should not find it completely novel. That is those of us – in older age cohorts a near majority – who were raised as mainline Protestant Christians.

We have watched over the years as rightwing evangelical churches turned the Jesus we grew up with into exactly the opposite of who we understood him to be. At its most basic, they turned a figure of love into a figure of hate who blesses precisely the cruelties that he condemned in the Gospel; we went from “the meek shall inherit the Earth” to “the meek shall die of cholera.” This has happened more slowly, over decades instead of months, but it is nonetheless unsettling in the same ways, a disorienting gut punch for many of us.

What particularly hurts is the fact that at no point did we manage to fight back, not effectively anyway. Without intending to, we surrendered control of the idea of Jesus. It is a story that may provide some insights into how to fight the attack on democracy.

  • Basic Glitch@sh.itjust.works
    111·
    12 hours ago

    That’s Matthew 10:34-36

    34 “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. 35 For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. 36 And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household.

    The “sword” is a metaphor for the sharp, divisive nature of Jesus’s message. It separates those who accept his teachings from those who reject them. Family division: The quote directly follows with examples of this division, such as a son against his father and a daughter against her mother. This is because a person’s commitment to Jesus could conflict with family loyalty and traditional beliefs. Spiritual conflict: The quote highlights that the true spiritual battle is not a physical one. It represents the internal and external conflict that arises when people make a profound choice to follow a new faith that may be at odds with their former way of life and family traditions.

    Essentially it means that the message of Jesus is going to be a hard pill to swallow for many people, and it definitely is.

    The book of Matthew also contains what Jesus himself indicates is the most important message in the Bible. If you take away nothing else from the old or new testaments, remember Matthew 22:36-40

    36 Master, which is the great commandment in the law? 37 Jesus said unto him, Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. 38 This is the first and great commandment. 39 And the second is like unto it, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 40 On these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets.

    The second is like unto it: You can’t complete the first commandment without following the other.

    If you truly love your God with all your heart, soul, and mind, you recognize him as the creator of all things. That means he created you and he created everyone and everything else on earth. To show your love and respect for his creation you must love yourself with everything that you are because you recognize you are one of his creations, and you must do the same for your neighbor and recognize that they are also his creation.

    For some reason, placing those two laws above all others, seems to be one of the most divisive parts of Christianity for many Christians.

    • HellsBelle@sh.itjust.worksOPEnglish
      2·
      8 hours ago

      I remember (about 20 yrs ago) struggling with my faith in the church, ie: why there were so many rules to follow. I figured that if Jesus had simplified most rules – to make believing easier – why was the church complicating things?

      That’s when I stumbled upon Matthew 22: 36-40 … and suddenly it all made sense.

      Not long after I left the church because I couldn’t stand the hypocrisy.

      • Basic Glitch@sh.itjust.works
        2·
        5 hours ago

        I eventually Speaking of hypocrisy and the church, you might like Matthew 23. I actually just came across it tonight. Its kinda funny that anger at the weaponization of Christianity on a national scale is what actually got me reading the bible again for the first time in decades, and wondering how much the pieces of my faith I didn’t even realize I had held onto this whole time might have ended up shaping me into who I am.

        Matthew 23 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples: 2 “The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. 3 So you must be careful to do everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach. 4 They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them.

      • Basic Glitch@sh.itjust.works
        1·
        5 hours ago

        Most of Matthew is full of pearls. Like 23:23

        A Warning Against Hypocrisy 23 Then Jesus said to the crowds and to his disciples: 2 “The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in Moses’ seat. 3 So you must be careful to do everything they tell you. But do not do what they do, for they do not practice what they preach. 4 They tie up heavy, cumbersome loads and put them on other people’s shoulders, but they themselves are not willing to lift a finger to move them.

        Fuck yeah, Jesus! Call out those oligarch POSs

        5 “Everything they do is done for people to see: They make their phylacteries[a] wide and the tassels on their garments long; 6 they love the place of honor at banquets and the most important seats in the synagogues; 7 they love to be greeted with respect in the marketplaces and to be called ‘Rabbi’ by others.

        8 “But you are not to be called ‘Rabbi,’ for you have one Teacher, and you are all brothers. 9 And do not call anyone on earth ‘father,’ for you have one Father, and he is in heaven. 10 Nor are you to be called instructors, for you have one Instructor, the Messiah. 11 The greatest among you will be your servant. 12 For those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.