I continue to struggle mightily to understand the role of Christianity in the last Presidential election. How Donald Trump, a despicable human being, a convicted felon on fraud charges, someone held liable for millions of dollars for sexual assault and abuse, garnered 56% of the ‘Christian’ vote is unsettling. How Donald Trump, whose behavior, politics, and inhumane policies run so contrary to what Christians should expect and require from a candidate for public office, could be the preferred choice among every subgroup of Christian voters is both stunning and disheartening. A recent opinion piece for USA Today boldly stated:
…Trump has, singlehandedly and without question, made this country more cruel, more dishonest, and more willing to believe immoral behavior can take you places… 2024 was a bad year for America’s sense of right and wrong. (Rex Huppke, USA Today, December 29, 2024)
How could Christians be so complicit in this development?
Tim Alberta, journalist for the Atlantic Magazine and bestselling author of The Kingdom, the Power, and the Glory: American Evangelicals in an Age of Extremism, provided in advance an extensive analysis of what happened, from its historical roots to present values and outcomes. One of my favorite quotes, the meaning and timely relevance of which far exceed the number of words it uses reads:
Christianity in today’s sad manifestation treats the “lesbian in a wheelchair” as a punch line. Christ would have treated her then --- and He regards her now--- as a treasure. –(Tim Alberta)
The ‘punch line’ is a ‘gut punch’ to me, the church and I hope, the country, not only in terms of that specific example but its other comparable substitutions. There are too many in our society who are treated as worthless, while Jesus sees them as priceless.
Remember the WWJD craze which occurred back in the 1990’s. We saw it on wrist bands, coffee mugs, tee shirts and banners of all kinds bearing the letters, WWJD- what would Jesus do. They were all over the place. What a brand marketing success. Today, I look back on the 1990’s saying: “at least were asking the right question when confronted by behavioral challenges and needed societal changes. When confronted by any moral or ethical dilemma we were factoring in Jesus and what we thought He would do. Well, we need a new craze. How about HWJRT- “How Would Jesus Regard Them?” The rich and the poor; The powerful and the vulnerable; Those who are employed and those out of work; Those who are immigrants, whether legal or not; Those who are free and those who are in prison; Those who live in mansions and those who are homeless. (USA Today reported this morning, December 27, 2024, that homelessness in America was 18.1% higher in 2024 than in 2023. HWJRT?) The list could go on, but I am convinced that when confronting these issues and the possible pathways to solving them, Christians must ask two questions: HWJRT? And WWJD?
A recent interview/conversation conducted by the New York Times columnist, David French, with Jonathan Rauch, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and the author of the upcoming book “Cross Purposes: Christianity’s Broken Bargain With Democracy” was titled:
What if Our Democracy Can’t Survive Without Christianity? (December 18, 2024)
The following is an excerpt from that conversation.
French: Your book divides American Christianity into three chunks. There’s “thin Christianity,” there’s “sharp Christianity” and then there’s “thick Christianity.” Thin Christianity and sharp Christianity are deficient in their own ways, and thick Christianity is what we’re aiming toward — thick Christianity is healthy within our democratic republic.
What is thin Christianity, and why is that a problem?
Rauch: Thin Christianity is my term for when Christianity becomes secularized and it becomes a consumer good, a commodity — people just shop for churches, and they like what they hear, and they’re not really challenged in church. And the problem with that is that a lot of the benefits of belief to the soul and to the Republic come from taking it seriously and participating — joining with a community, giving of yourself to others — not just treating it as a consumer good.
What is sharp Christianity?
Rauch: Well, you can attest, of all people, how sharp “sharp Christianity” actually is. So, this is a kind of Christianity that perceives itself increasingly as being at war with the culture around it.
This is the Christianity that’s afraid that it’s losing its predominant cultural role in American society and the next election is the one that will end Christianity as we know it. And so, it becomes smaller, and more and more paranoid and frightened about its future. And as it does those things, it also becomes more political.
Thick Christianity?
And your argument about thick Christianity isn’t that people need to be less Christian; you argue they need to dive more into the teachings of Jesus.
Christians have a teaching about how individuals should relate to the world around them. …that’s what Christianity needs more of: teachings about how would Jesus approach politics. economics, in particular wealth inequality, culture war, global warming and climate change, homelessness, hunger, poverty, sexual assault, abuse and rape, prison reform and the death penalty. etc. etc.
How timely!
As there were in past administrations, there are so many monumental challenges ahead of us in the next. President-elect Trump posted an ominous message on Christmas Day. Some have called it a ‘Villain’s Monologue’ and it was so Trumpian, that is, filled with lies and threats, preposterous proposals and insults that confirm his lack of understanding of the Christian faith. One issue caught my attention, his comment about the death penalty. Recently, (December 12, 2024) President Biden issued a controversial, record-breaking commutation of 1500 non-violent criminals who were already living on home confinement and ‘have shown successful rehabilitation and a strong commitment to making their communities safer.’ In that same act, he also pardoned thirty-nine more, once incarcerated of non-violent crimes. Finally, two days before Christmas, he weighed in on the death penalty itself. Anticipating the barbarism of project 2025 and the incoming Trump administration’s promise to use the Justice department to aggressively seek the death penalty in the future, he commuted the death sentences of thirty-seven of forty death row inmates from execution to life imprisonment without parole. Only three remain in Federal Prison, still scheduled for execution, Robert Bowers, The Tree of Life Synagogue shooter, Dylann Roof, the mass shooter at the Mother Immanuel Church in South Carolina and Dzhokhar A. Tsarnaev, the Boston Bomber. I wish that President Biden had commuted all forty. I do not believe that Jesus would have approved the execution any of them.
President-elect Trump posted a one-hour Christmas Day rant on Truth Social. The following was a small part of his message:
Also, to the 37 most violent criminals, who killed, raped, and plundered like virtually no one before them, but were just given, incredibly, a pardon by Sleepy Joe Biden,” “I refuse to wish a Merry Christmas to those lucky ‘souls’ but, instead, will say, GO TO HELL!”
First, it was not a pardon but a commutation. Second, do you not agree that “Go to Hell” is incongruent with the Christmas message?
To that post and all others that he might transmit regarding the targets of his rage, retribution, and revenge, I want us to show that we are working to become not ‘thin,’ ‘not sharp’ but ‘thick Christians.’ I want us to dig deeply into the teachings of Jesus, teachings that I know will help us develop and exert a more Christian influence on the crucial challenges of our time. Again, Rauch says it this way:
…that’s what Christianity needs more of: teachings about how would Jesus approach politics. economics, in particular wealth inequality, culture war, global warming and climate change, homelessness, hunger, poverty, sexual assault, abuse and rape, prison reform and the death penalty. etc. etc.
In this Christmas season, we Christians are called to acknowledge and celebrate the fulfillment of the ancient prophesy from Isaiah. I recited these words every Christmas Eve at First Church when I lit the Christ Candle at the center of our Advent wreath.
2 [a]The people who walked in darkness
have seen a great light;
those who lived in a land of deep darkness—
on them light has shined.
(Isaiah 9:2 New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition)
When Jesus then sat on that hillside overlooking the Sea of Galilee with thousands gathered around him, His light shone, and He saw that light in them. He sees that light in us. Remember these words?
14 “You are the light of the world. A city built on a hill cannot be hid. 15 No one after lighting a lamp puts it under the bushel basket, but on the lampstand, and it gives light to all in the house. 16 In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father in heaven. (Matthew 5:14-16, nrsvue)
Let us not walk fearfully in the darkness of our time and with voices silenced. Rather, let our light shine before others when we speak and function as Jesus teaches us. May we find our way of faith in the truth and wisdom we encounter in the answers to these two questions:
HWJRT? and WWJD?