Ask the right questions: Where have we been led?

Today I saw the typical evangelical mantra from someone who means very well, something along the lines of: "Christians are not Democrats or Republicans; we do not fit well into either party." (This was initially said by a guy who was unwilling to separate from a fellow pastor who had a willful policy of covering up sexual abuse and blaming its victims in his churches.)

My gut reaction to the statement, though, is, "WELL DUH." Most Americans don't fit well into one or the other main parties right now, either.

The problem I have with what was said is the context of it. It is essentially a lazy way for a Christian to say I can't vote or I can't support the pro-choice Democrats even if the country is being torn apart by fascism and abuse, because I am a Christian first. It sounds to me like voter suppression, frankly, and I think it does indeed have that affect on some evangelicals. I don't think that is how it is intended, because the statement, in itself, is very true. But I do think the way evangelicals have conducted themselves during this period in our history is deeply lacking in self-awareness.

This led to my sub-tweet:

If you believe women must submit to men and authoritarianism is ok, the leaders you vote for will reflect your values. But those are not Christ's values. Nor are such values conducive to truth or freedom. What we are seeing unfold in our country is a result of evangelical values.

We have looked, through my posts, at some of the lies that got US where we are, and I encourage you to review the questions I have asked. I did not answer every question that can be posed about the lies that led US here, in targeting the authoritarian abuse and fascist violence and the controlling aims of the extreme pro-life movement. I leave that to my readers to work through, and I trust you to come to your own conclusions on what I am getting at in American and evangelical thinking.

What we need to do now, in the context of past discussion of the Lies that got US where we are today, is sit for a moment and ask not, "Where do we go from here?" which should be asked at a later stage indeed, but, "Where are we?" I have suggested some reasons why we are where we are, but where is that?

First, when I say we are where we are because of evangelical values, what are we seeing that is consistent with these alleged evangelical values?

We are seeing authoritarian abuse, disgraceful disrespect for women, unbelievable callousness towards protestors and the sick. There is a sort of nihilistic deterministic fatalism in the way lives are being upended by this regime, and many evangelicals are going on with their lives as if this is normal and everything is fine.

Some, I'm sure will take issue with that and be most appalled I would frame it that way.

Well, what do you expect? When your loudest voices are not speaking out against Trumpism, preferring to speak out against politics, what are the rest of US to conclude? It certainly isn't indicative of love for country or fellow citizens. The whole other-worldly mentality that ignores the concerns of others because they are earthly issues, is sickness and entirely wrong. You cannot just advocate for dignifying refugees and immigrants, let alone the unborn. You must, if you are a Christian, actually love your neighbor and care how you impact their actual lives by how you participate in the community, or not.

Politics is not the main issue here; it's just a symptom of something far more insidious. Partisanship is not even the biggest issue. A narcissistic lack of love and an evangelical superiority complex is the real issue, and evangelicals are not innocent in how enmeshed they are with their level of entitlement.

So the point is, evangelicalism has certain spoken beliefs they maintain, but the heart of the matter is they have certain heart attitudes they also cultivate, deceiving even themselves about their true nature.

The heart of abuse is in a grasping for power and control. And, what else could you have called an evangelical vote for Trump? No one can seriously call it a pro-life vote at this point. His feds are gassing moms for peacefully protecting protestors. You can't be a Christian (Little Christ) and blame the victim, even if you don't agree politically with the actions they take. It does not matter that evangelicals claim to love God and love others if their actions make it very clear they despise others who don't follow their preferred political or religious behaviors. When they say that "it's very sad kids are separated from their mothers on our border, but the parents should have come here legally," not only do they display their repugnant ignorant entitlement, they display a total disregard for human life.

So my assertion is this: evangelicals in America, those who seek to influence society the most, actually have some God-awful views about people and life and love. And those values they hold are excused as part of their openly professed beliefs. They are ultimately absolutely willing to sacrifice many human lives to promote their preferred agendas.

So let's think about an example of this.

The evangelicals like to say they value and love all people. Yet many evangelicals strongly object to women in leadership positions in their churches, and certainly in their homes. This view is tolerated by egalitarian evangelicals as a difference of opinion and a matter of spiritual maturity. (This can give those who have come to a place of equal acceptance of both genders, a sense of being more spiritual, while the other group feels the same because their women are humbly submitted. So already in the subculture itself, we have superiority complexes and different levels of spiritual maturity being set up. Supremacy.)

Then say these people vote, the ones who don't believe women should lead. They see a man who assaults women and treats them like dirt when they are in leadership positions, and they do not like the female candidate because she is thought corrupt and is pro-choice (they hear, an abortionist). Naturally, they will vote for the man, because a little bit of p*ssy-grabbing is just not as serious as being an un-submissive woman.

To sum up, this is just one example of how evangelical values, which look mildly patriarchal or archaic, or old-fashioned, or traditional, actually work out in practice of being oppressive and quite cruel to victims of abuse and women in the workplace or society in general. It is no wonder that American evangelicals get lumped in with the extremes of the Handmaid's Tale, when you delve more deeply into what many evangelical men really think about women in general. Just read their private Facebook page message boards and watch how they defend each other, even when they promote themselves as moderate on the issue of women in the church.

You see, Christian nationalism doesn't stay in the pews. It seeks to infiltrate society (evangelicals see it as establishing the kingdom, growing something like a mustard seed, or working its way through society like yeast through dough.) The problem is that evangelicals in America have been on an aggressive footing for decades, trying to "turn the culture back to Christ," when America was never Christlike to begin with.

The basic beliefs of evangelicals, that got US where we find ourselves today, involve a tolerance for a history of slavery, if it worked to spread the gospel, a minimization of sexual abuse, because the woman should have dressed more modestly, and a ridicule of those who take abuse seriously, because "all have sinned" so who can truly judge the hearts of the abusers?

Don't believe me, join an evangelical church for a year. Call out abuse honestly wherever you see it, ask folks firmly why they tolerate bad ideas and anti-intellectual views, and notice how many friends you have at the end of it all.

See, what I am saying is that we are where we are because of bad ideas, and ideas do have consequences. Certainly, the evangelical church is not to blame for ALL the evils that America has tolerated or even embraced, but as Church, they are far more culpable for their inability to self-examine and repent, than the wider society is.

Have you noticed the evangelicals have made a huge deal of the sins they see in others outside their faith? Have you noticed they get very upset if you point out their blind spots on Trump or quote Scripture back at them? It's very interesting, isn't it. You would think that a faith based in repentance and forgiveness would care far less about labeling those outside and far more about dealing with and purifying what is inside. You'd also think a faith based in love would care to dignify its neighbor, even if that means shutting down its buildings and wearing a mask as the experts recommend. You would think a faith that is submitted to the true and living God would be anxious to love others sacrificially any way that it can, rather than demanding its freedom to not do so.

So I watch the events in Portland and the lawlessness of this administration and the callousness of Christians online through this filter now: where we are is a direct result of where we have been. And the resistance in America to facing our past and the ugliness of much of our founding and expansion as a nation, are enabled and even supported and spread by Christians stateside. They are not countering an antiChrist culture, they are far too often promoters of it.

This is where we are. This is where many of US who grew up in evangelicalism were led. This is where evangelicalism has led US, when it finally took control. Not to a place of humility and love, but to a place of power and control, of abuse, of arrogance, of narcissism.

How do we respond to this? I want to address the question of "where do we go from here?" and "here" seems to me to be a place of (hopefully) rock bottom. Repentance is certainly in order, per Christian thought. I can talk more about that next week. But for now, we need to consider where we are. The question that arises after considering the lies that led US here, is where is here, and how do we deal with it now. Repentance, change, this is not an instant process, whatever the tele-evangelists might proclaim. The Christian walk is a "long obedience in the same direction" (Neitzsche), and it starts with acknowledging what got US here, and taking some time to unpack those lies in our own lives, before we can actually move forward in the right direction.

My argument, like that of many others, is we need a time of lament. We who are Christians most certainly bear huge responsibility for what we have enabled and even supported. We can't be reconciled with unrepentant people and just brush over sin. We need to face where we are, look honestly at it, own it, and grieve it. Some of us are grieving loss of life and loved ones in all this. We have lost whole families and church communities for following Christ. There is deep pain there. We need a time to grieve, to be still, to let ourselves feel.

Then, or within that process, depending on our personality and needs, we need to ask the questions of ourselves and others and society in general. We need to be prepared to unpack everything that has happened, see the connections to events and beliefs prior, and we need to humbly accept the responsibility to work through the questions without accepting pat answers from ourselves or others. We need to apply the Socratic method to our beliefs, attitudes, and actions. We need to listen to others who ask us hard questions, without getting defensive. Frankly, more Christians would benefit from reading Camus' The Plague than their John Piper study booklets. (If your faith can't hold water when engaging with the thoughts of atheists, it isn't worth that much.)

Finally, I'd say we need to start educating ourselves and others about what constitutes political terminology and why it matters. Instead of having this notion that politics are somehow bad or separate from our Christian faith, evangelicals in America need to learn and understand that even the NSDAP were just thought a regular political party, until they were the Nazis. Some Christians even supported them, too. We don't look back on that period of history and say that the "Christians shouldn't have been political" by opposing Hitler. We look back and mourn the historical events that unfolded because of fascist evil and genocidal abuse.

It has been amazing to me to see Christians use the same propaganda that the Nazis used, saying such things as "go home," to the stranger, or complaining of "cultural Marxism" as a serious threat to their freedom to believe as they do. It is horrifying to see them demonize moderate fellow citizens as "leftist"extremist, when you know that is exactly how the Nazis created fear and solidified an extreme right wing alternative. It's almost worse than everything to see they arrogantly proclaim that the Nazis were, "socialists" because of the "S" in "NSDAP." Well, they clearly also claimed to the "democratic," but we see how well that worked out in reality.

Worst of all is the rejection of democracy we are experiencing from many evangelicals, who do not understand that tyrannical government is ultimately dangerous for all citizens, however much it purports to care about a religious group or not. And worse than that is the total lack of love for their neighbors, displayed by these narcissists, who just do not care what happens to their neighbors, as long as they themselves stay safe.

I could go on, but the point is this: we are exactly where many of us educated folk feared we might be, back in 2015, when we saw this man rise. And he is just a man, but even just a man can do much damage if given unlimited powers. It makes no sense to dismiss his impact on the lives of others, then claim to be pro-life. Whether that's Calvinism or cowardice, it is most certainly, a sinful heart attitude.

Our response must be to ask questions of ourselves and others, to work through the lament of how we got here, to unpack the lies that reeled US in. What were the character deficiencies that made US vulnerable? But one thing we cannot do: we have no right as Christians to blame this on those outside for "making us do this." That is just yet another evidence of abuse. Instead, we need to humble ourselves and grieve a while.

It starts with humility; it begins with lament.

Where are we, American Church?

Recommended Meditation:

Lamentations 3 (NIV)

3 [a]I am the man who has seen affliction by the rod of the Lord’s wrath. 2 He has driven me away and made me walk in darkness rather than light; 3 indeed, he has turned his hand against me again and again, all day long. 4 He has made my skin and my flesh grow old and has broken my bones. 5 He has besieged me and surrounded me with bitterness and hardship. 6 He has made me dwell in darkness like those long dead. 7 He has walled me in so I cannot escape; he has weighed me down with chains. 8 Even when I call out or cry for help, he shuts out my prayer. 9 He has barred my way with blocks of stone; he has made my paths crooked. 10 Like a bear lying in wait, like a lion in hiding, 11 he dragged me from the path and mangled me and left me without help. 12 He drew his bow and made me the target for his arrows. 13 He pierced my heart with arrows from his quiver. 14 I became the laughingstock of all my people; they mock me in song all day long. 15 He has filled me with bitter herbs and given me gall to drink. 16 He has broken my teeth with gravel; he has trampled me in the dust. 17 I have been deprived of peace; I have forgotten what prosperity is. 18 So I say, “My splendor is gone and all that I had hoped from the Lord.” 19 I remember my affliction and my wandering, the bitterness and the gall. 20 I well remember them, and my soul is downcast within me. 21 Yet this I call to mind and therefore I have hope: 22 Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. 23 They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. 24 I say to myself, “The Lord is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.” 25 The Lord is good to those whose hope is in him, to the one who seeks him; 26 it is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord. 27 It is good for a man to bear the yoke while he is young. 28 Let him sit alone in silence, for the Lord has laid it on him. 29 Let him bury his face in the dust— there may yet be hope. 30 Let him offer his cheek to one who would strike him, and let him be filled with disgrace. 31 For no one is cast off by the Lord forever. 32 Though he brings grief, he will show compassion, so great is his unfailing love. 33 For he does not willingly bring affliction or grief to anyone. 34 To crush underfoot all prisoners in the land, 35 to deny people their rights before the Most High, 36 to deprive them of justice— would not the Lord see such things? 37 Who can speak and have it happen if the Lord has not decreed it? 38 Is it not from the mouth of the Most High that both calamities and good things come? 39 Why should the living complain when punished for their sins? 40 Let us examine our ways and test them, and let us return to the Lord. 41 Let us lift up our hearts and our hands to God in heaven, and say: 42 “We have sinned and rebelled and you have not forgiven. 43 “You have covered yourself with anger and pursued us; you have slain without pity. 44 You have covered yourself with a cloud so that no prayer can get through. 45 You have made us scum and refuse among the nations. 46 “All our enemies have opened their mouths wide against us. 47 We have suffered terror and pitfalls, ruin and destruction.” 48 Streams of tears flow from my eyes because my people are destroyed. 49 My eyes will flow unceasingly, without relief, 50 until the Lord looks down from heaven and sees. 51 What I see brings grief to my soul because of all the women of my city. 52 Those who were my enemies without cause hunted me like a bird. 53 They tried to end my life in a pit and threw stones at me; 54 the waters closed over my head, and I thought I was about to perish. 55 I called on your name, Lord, from the depths of the pit. 56 You heard my plea: “Do not close your ears to my cry for relief.” 57 You came near when I called you, and you said, “Do not fear.” 58 You, Lord, took up my case; you redeemed my life. 59 Lord, you have seen the wrong done to me. Uphold my cause! 60 You have seen the depth of their vengeance, all their plots against me. 61 Lord, you have heard their insults, all their plots against me— 62 what my enemies whisper and mutter against me all day long. 63 Look at them! Sitting or standing, they mock me in their songs. 64 Pay them back what they deserve, Lord, for what their hands have done. 65 Put a veil over their hearts, and may your curse be on them! 66 Pursue them in anger and destroy them from under the heavens of the Lord. Footnotes

Lamentations 3:1 This chapter is an acrostic poem; the verses of each stanza begin with the successive letters of the Hebrew alphabet, and the verses within each stanza begin with the same letter.