CHRIST-APP by philtierneyblog

4.    Trump violates the core of Jesus’ teachings.

Jesus’ core teaching was this: “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself.” (Matthew 22, Mark 12, Luke 10) If following Jesus is about anything it’s about putting that core principle of love into practice. Jesus always only pointed to God and to the needs of others. 

Trump always only points to himself. He always only tells others to look at him, listen to him, to give him the honor and the glory and to trust him. Trump consistently divides people. He turns people against each other for his own purposes. He disseminates hatred, mistrust, contempt and conflict. Trump’s message is the opposite of Jesus’ message – malice not love.  American Christians, who follow and support Trump, are seen as violating Jesus’ message.

When Jesus was asked who the neighbor is that should be loved, He told what we call the Parable of the Good Samaritan. You may recall that parable. This is what happened:

^“On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. ‘Teacher,’ he asked, ‘what must I do to inherit eternal life?’

‘What is written in the Law?’ Jesus replied. ‘How do you read it?’

The lawyer answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind;’ and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

‘You have answered correctly,’ Jesus replied. ‘Do this and you will live.’

But the man wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, ‘And who is my neighbor?’

In reply Jesus said: ‘A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’

‘Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?’

The expert in Jewish law replied, ‘The one who had mercy on him.’

Jesus told him, ‘Go and do likewise.’” (Luke 10: 25-37)

Jesus’s story describes love as practical compassion put into action. There was more to it than that, though. Samaritans were despised by Jesus’s Jewish audience. Jews thought that Samaritans were ritually unclean, ethnically impure and religiously heretical. They wouldn’t have anything to do with them. And yet Jesus chose to make a Samaritan the hero of His story, emphasizing that a neighbor is anyone with a need to be met, even strangers different and alien from you. Jesus calls upon us to focus on others and meet their needs, especially if they are unrelated to us and different from us, even repulsive to us.

There was more to the story, though. If the hero in this parable, the example of neighbor love, was despicable in the minds of His audience, the antiheros in the story were the religious elite of the time. It would be as if Jesus told the same story, today, and made the hero Gay, Lesbian or an undocumented alien and the antiheros a Charismatic evangelist or a Catholic bishop. How would that affect you? That’s the effect this story had on His contemporary audience, back then.

Jesus always called His audiences to focus on God and on the needs of others. He always called upon his listeners and disciples to be compassionate and to put compassion into practical action. Jesus did so in ways that broke down the prejudices and righteous indignations of His followers.

On the other hand, Trump always only calls upon his followers to focus on him, on themselves and on their own needs and grievances. “You need more money,” he tells them, “and I’m the only one who can get it for you.” “You need your rights,” he tells them, “and I’m the only one who can protect you.”  Trump’s focus is consistently opposite from Jesus’s focus – on self rather than others, on those who are like us rather than different from us, and on himself rather than God.

Likewise, Trump’s attitude toward those who offend, transgress or hurt us is opposite from Jesus’s teachings. Trump violates Jesus’s teaching on forgiveness. Perhaps you remember this episode: “Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, ‘Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother or sister who sins against me? Up to seven times?’Jesus answered, ‘I tell you, not seven times, but seventy-seven times. (Matthew 18: 21f) Trump, on the other hand, has publicly declared to his Christian audience at the “Faith and Freedom Caucus,” “I will be your retribution!” American Christians in his audience cheered. For what do American Christians need revenge? Why would they cheer when Trump called for it? Why would they embrace vengeance and turn away from Jesus’s teachings, calling them “woke?”

Remember what Jesus said in the “Sermon on the Mount.” 

“But to you who are listening I say: Love your enemies, do good to those who hate you,bless those who curse you, pray for those who mistreat you.If someone slaps you on one cheek, turn to them the other also. If someone takes your coat, do not withhold your shirt from them. Give to everyone who asks you, and if anyone takes what belongs to you, do not demand it back. Do to others as you would have them do to you… But love your enemies, do good to them, and lend to them without expecting to get anything back. Then your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High, because he is kind to the ungrateful and wicked. Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.” (Luke 6: 27-36)

Jesus taught us to forgive those who hurt you. He taught us to “turn the other cheek.” He taught us to do good to those we consider our enemies. As even the Torah says, “Do not seek revenge or bear a grudge against anyone among your people, but love your neighbor as yourself. I am the Lord.” (Leviticus 19:18f)

Trump urges people to abandon the Torah, to violate Jesus’ teachings and to follow his own example and selfish mindset, instead.

5.     Trump violates Jesus’ “Golden Rule.”

As I mentioned, Jesus taught what love means. In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus explained what He meant by love.  It’s His rule of thumb or, as we’ve come to call it, the “Golden Rule.” In King James English, Jesus said, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.” Put more simply: “Treat others as you want to be treated.” 

Many white American Christians have apparently forgotten what it meant for our ancestors to come as refugees and immigrants to this alien land. Many came to find refuge. All of them were immigrants and mane were refugees. The only reason many seeking refuge from the Irish “potato famine” were admitted to the United States was on condition that Irishmen fight with the Union army during the Civil War. Italian immigrants were treated with suspicion because they were thought to be non-white. German Americans were sometimes beaten, tarred and feathered, or lynched and German was banned from public schools. The Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 banned Chinese from entering the U.S. or becoming citizens. The Asiatic Barred Zone Act prohibited all immigration from the Middle East, Central Asia, South and Southeast Asia. The Immigration Act of 1924 severely restricted immigration by Southern and Eastern Europeans (including Jewish immigrants) and barred immigration of “aliens ineligible for citizenship” from Asia entirely. American citizens have almost always made it difficult for later arrivals to immigrate.

The same is true, today. American Christians have largely taken a very restrictive position on immigration, especially of immigrants from Latin America and Islamic countries. They have supported Trump and followed his lead in severely restricting immigration and mistreating immigrants. American Christians, especially white Christians, are following his lead. Many have even remained silent in his treatment of Latin American immigrants. When Trump separated refugee children from their parents and locked them in cages, more than 5,600 of them, American Christians largely remained acquiescent. Those children were refugees from gang violence, sex slavery, destitution, oppressive military regimes and drug cartels, starvation and persecution. Instead, Trump branded those refugees gangsters, rapists, drug peddlers and criminals, and he locks them up. And yet, most are simple devout Christians.

Admittedly, established Americans have always abused immigrants to some extent, whether Africans, Irish, Italians, Germans, Chinese, Southern Europeans, Catholics, Eastern Europeans, Jews, Asians or Latinos. But Trump not only demonized current refugees, he psychologically tortured their children on our behalf, saying that they would take what belongs to us. Is that the way you would want to be treated or for your ancestors to have been treated? Does that sound like Jesus to you? Trump tempts his Christian supporters to act opposite from the way Jesus taught – with fear and hatred rather than active, need-meeting love. For Christians to support Trump is to support the violation of the Golden Rule.

In this respect Trump also seduces Christians to violate the Hebrew Torah. It is written in Leviticus, “When a foreigner comes among you in your land, do not mistreat them. The foreigner residing among you must be treated as your native-born. Love them as yourself, for you were foreigners in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.” (Leviticus 19: 33 f) To treat others as you would not want your ancestors or your selves to be treated violates what Jesus and the Hebrew Scriptures command. Trump and his followers contradict that.

Since the Old Testament writings repeatedly reminded the Jewish people to treat immigrants among them with dignity and respect because they were once aliens, themselves, let me go further.  Heilsgeschichte, the history of God’s salvation, depended upon undocumented refugee immigration. Abram sought refuge in Egypt from famine in Canaan. He was undocumented, but was allowed into Egypt, not because he and his wife feared starvation, but because he claimed that his apparently attractive wife was his sister. Jacob was a refugee in Mesopotamia to escape his brother’s murderous rage. He was a chain migrant, living with his uncle. Jacob’s sons were refugees from Canaan during a drought and famine. They, too, were chain migrants, who joined their brother, Joseph in Egypt. The Israelites were refugees from slavery in Egypt and became unwelcomed immigrants in Canaan. According to Matthew’s Gospel, even Jesus was a refugee immigrant to Egypt to escape murder by King Herod.

If none of them sought refuge by migrating, without official permission, they may have died and the line of salvation would have been broken. As it was, God provided for their survival and the salvation of the world through their unpermitted immigration to find refuge. Immigration to find refuge has been integral to our salvation. Many immigrants are refugees from death or fates just as bad. Treating refugees as you’d like to be treated includes helping immigrants find safe homelands.

Treating others as you’d like to be treated actually goes further than how American Christians treat refugees or anyone else in any kind of need. It includes how you treat those, who don’t think, believe or act as you do. Let me give you an example. It became fashionable from the time of the Reformation for Catholic leaders to brand not only Protestant Reformers, but also Humanists in general, as enemies of God.

There was a resurgence of that spirit of animosity toward Humanists among Protestants in America not too long after the Civil War. Starting in the 1870’s, there was an explosion of new discovery in medicine, the sciences, inventions, and academia, in general. New intellectual tools were used to explore everything from biology and chemistry to archeology and historical writings. That included the Bible. Disagreements arose between biblical scholars and other seminary professors who wanted to study the Bible as set of ancient writings and those who wanted to study the Bible as writings inspired by God and infallible. That led to what was called the “Modernist/Fundamentalist Controversy.”

About a hundred years ago, most Protestant denominations split in two. On the one side were Fundamentalists and Evangelicals, who embraced Scripture as infallible and, on the other, as those who took a more selective and Humanist approach to the Bible. From that time on, conservative and liberal Protestant Christians have increasingly considered each other as enemies. And that has spilled over into American politics, as well.

Many American conservative Christian leaders, Protestant and Catholic, consider Secular Humanists, the sciences, intellectuals and liberals (whether Christians or not) to be enemies. That feeling has now been reciprocated to some extent. This goes back to the idea that some people, including many Christian leaders, feel compelled to turn those who disagree with them into “straw men,” adversaries or enemies to demonize.

Do you remember that story of Jesus and his disciples passing through Samaria?  It comes from Luke 9: 49-56.

“’Master,’ said John, ‘we saw someone driving out demons in your name and we tried to stop him, because he is not one of us.’  ‘Do not stop him,’ Jesus said, ‘for whoever is not against you is for you.’

As the time approached for him to be taken up to heaven, Jesus resolutely set out for Jerusalem. And he sent messengers on ahead, who went into a Samaritan village to get things ready for him; but the people there did not welcome him, because he was heading for Jerusalem.When the disciples James and John saw this, they asked, ‘Lord, do you want us to call fire down from heaven to destroy them?’But Jesus turned and rebuked them. Then he and his disciples went to another village.’”

In these instances, Jesus corrected His closest disciples. In both cases His friends saw those who weren’t on their side as competitors or enemies. Their impulse was to stop or actually punish them and, in the latter case, to have God do the punishing. Jesus was not inclined to make enemies of those who were unaffiliated with Him or who rejected Him.

Christians, nowadays, should follow Jesus’s lead and resist the temptation to make those who reject Jesus into enemies. If Christians don’t want others to make enemies of them, Christians shouldn’t make enemies of others. In other words, treat others as you want to be treated. Of course, that’s opposite from Trump’s mindset, and so, American Christians must choose whom to follow, Jesus or Trump.