21st Century Christianity

Besides Evangelicals, the Right has managed to capture a portion of  the nation's 70 million Catholics by focusing on the issue of abortion.  Reporting on a Trump call-in with Catholic educators and bishops, an op-ed writer at the New York Daily News noted that the listeners missed an “opportunity to speak truth to power” when none challenged Trump's assertion that he is “the best [President] in the history of the Catholic Church.” None of them “challenged his cruelty toward immigrants, denial of climate change, cuts to food assistance or his pattern of racist demagoguery....Catholic teaching can’t be reduced to the single issue [of abortion]. Pope Francis is unequivocal that the “lives of the poor, those already born, the destitute” are as “equally sacred,” in his words, as the unborn in the womb. That Catholic leaders did not point this out to Trump “compromised the moral clarity of the Church's teachings.” [2] 

Yes, there are many single issue “religious” voters, but there are also many others who try to look at the totality of the Christian message. In fact, Christianity's message of love of God and love of neighbor is universal among the world's religions. As the AFSC slogan goes: “Love Thy Neighbor – No Exceptions.”

Jim Wallis is an Evangelical theologian and writer. He is the founder and editor of Sojourner magazine and one of my favorite authors. He relates an “experiment” that he and another young theology student carried out. They cut out every reference to the poor and vulnerable from a Bible. The result, Wallis says, resembled “Swiss cheese.” 

In his book On God's Side, Wallis summarizes the “Judgment of Nations” - one of the most challenging texts of the New Testament. It's one of the few places where Jesus makes a point of saying who better be watching their backs at the Last Judgment. "Jesus, unlike our religious institutions, continually speaks out against judgmentalism. But the only time Jesus is judgmental himself is on the subject of the poor." The condemned, the goats, are shocked by what Jesus will say to them at the Last Judgment. "When did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or without clothes, or a stranger, or sick, or in prison?" He will answer them, "Amen, I say to you, what you did not do for one of these least ones, you did not do for me." 

Wallis makes two particular points in his discussion of Matthew 25. The first is that "nations", as well as individuals, are being judged. This is about collective as well as individual decisions about who or what is most important. The second is that "Christ's judgment here is not about having the wrong doctrine or theology; it's not about sexual misdeeds, or any other personal sin or failure. The everlasting judgment here is based on how we have treated the poorest and most vulnerable in our midst and in the world...[The] good or ill we have done to them [is]...the moral equivalent of how we have treated him." 

In his America's Original Sin: Racism, White Privilege, and the Bridge to a New America, Jim Wallis puts racism in its spiritual and historical context. The book, published in 2015, developed out of work that Wallis had been doing for years and is particularly relevant today. An excerpt from Wallis's 2013 essay on racism in Sojourner is in the sidebar. Wallis concludes his essay noting that the strategies for how black people must confront and finally overcome white racism in America must always originate within the black community itself. The role of white allies in the struggle against racism is to “examine ourselves, our relationships, our institutions, and our society for the ugly plague of racism. Whites in America must admit the reality and begin to operate on the assumption that theirs is a racist society. Positive individual attitudes are simply not enough, for, as we have seen, racism is more than just personal...White racism in white institutions must be eradicated by white people and not just black people. In fact, white racism is primarily a white responsibility.” 

In the same book, Wallis also writes of the "painful and combustible connection between poverty, crime and hopelessness" and continues: “I am often puzzled by the question that some middle-class white people ask when they see protests about economic inequality and unequal criminal justice. The question, asked directly or indirectly, usually seems to be, "What do they want?" And the "they" always implies people of color. The best answer I've heard lately to that question came from a young man I met in Ferguson, Missouri. He said, "What do I want? I want an education, a job, and a family."

In contrast to the single issue voter's position, the social teachings of the Catholic Church have long championed the cause of all of the most vulnerable members of society. The current pope, Francis, has increased the focus on the Church's mission to the poor and the vulnerable, including a blunt critique of unregulated capitalism.  From the beginning, he has also been a defender of migrants and refugees, and in his first encyclical, he made the connection between environmental justice and poverty. A sampling of his statements and writing on social justice are in the sidebar.  Also in the sidebar, a Catholic priest explains what it really means to be "Pro-Life'.  

In the United States, the National Conference of Catholic Bishops adapted a liturgy for the Stations of the Cross: Overcoming Racism, basing it on the 2018 pastoral letter against racism “Open Wide Our Hearts: The Enduring Call to Love”.   I attended one of these Stations of the Cross services recently and was awed at the directness of the message. I found it a powerful reflection on the harm of racism in 21st century America and a call for not only conversion of hearts but also for action to end systemic racism.

Besides faith leaders, many others with strong religious convictions are responding to the toxic civic environment of 2020 America and the serious decision we face in November.

A group of Republicans is urging Christians and Republicans to not re-elect Trump in the 2020 presidential election. A recently released ad, entitled “Trump is Using Us,” features six Republican voters who talk about how Trump uses and manipulates Christians.  In the minute-long video posted on the Republican Voters Against Trump YouTube channel, the group explains that the president doesn’t reflect Christianity or values based on his words and actions. [sidebar] Highlights include Trump's comments following a violent white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in 2017 and his infamous photo-op where peaceful demonstrators for racial justice were forcibly cleared by law enforcement.

Earlier this month, a group of Catholic theologians, activists and nuns signed an open letter to Catholic voters urging them to oppose President Donald Trump, who they argue “flouts core values at the heart of Catholic social teaching.” More than 150 Catholics, including former staffers at the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, signed the letter, which was organized by Faith in Public Life Action, a faith-based liberal advocacy group. “While neither political party or candidate reflects the fullness of Catholic teaching on every issue,” the letter said, “President Trump’s character, policy decisions and cruelty toward anyone who challenges him demonstrates a fundamental contempt for what it means to be a Christian.” [3]

The Right does not have a monopoly on morality and religion, and the Center-Left does not go far enough in applying the religious and philosophical principles that can lead to Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King's “Beloved Community,”  The expression is derived from the biblical concept of the "Kingdom of God on Earth"  - not in the sense of a rapturous future time but in the sense of a goal achievable by a critical mass of committed people across the world.  King identified the triple evils that stood as barriers to the Beloved Community as racism, poverty, and militarism.  He worked all his adult life against those evils. 

My generation has tried but in the end we have come up short. Many of us are still trying but a younger generation of Americans will be needed to finish the work. With a conservative majority on the Supreme Court for the foreseeable future, it may not be easy.