There are people in my family who believe Christianity to be so inherently oppressive and harmful, that anyone who identifies as Christian is culpable for all of the harm done by all imperial colonization by Christian empires and nations, all harm done to Native Americans, to LGBTQ people, most slavery, racism, genocide, ecocide, and basically almost every problem the world has had for 2000 years.
Theirs is not an unusual view. I encounter this view regularly here in the Northeast US, though most people assign the blame to religion in general. For parts of my family, Christianity is the true evil because it was so popular, and thus the religion most commonly tied to violent and oppressive political leaders and structures.
I also encounter this attitude from feminists, quite frequently. According to many feminists, I am everything that is anti-feminist and misogynist… precisely, solely because I am Christian.
A few years ago, one family member directly compared me with a Trump supporter. He was explaining that he had found a way to tolerate my presence at family gatherings by consulting with Native American friends about how they tolerated family members who were Trump supporters. “Don’t poke at it all the time,” they told him. “You don’t have to hash out all your differences at every holiday dinner.” So he decided to follow their advice and try to coexist peacefully with me… me, the deplorable, Trump-supporter equivalent.
I was glad for the truce. However, it really got me thinking about Trump supporters. It gave me wonderful, important work to do, to wrestle with being categorized as the moral equivalent of Trump supporters. The work started with feeling personally hurt. Why would he, someone who knows me so well, knows so much about my lifelong work as a peacebuilder and prophet for justice, insult me this way? But hurt feelings can be such beautiful teachers if we let them. I prayed about it, and I thought and meditated about Jesus… I remembered Mark 6:4 saying, “Prophets are not without honor, except in their hometown, and among their own kin, and in their own house.”(NRSV) And I thought about how Jesus was the leader of a religious reform movement, as are all prophets, and how some people surely thought he went too far with his constant criticism of the greedy temple leaders in collusion with oppressive government, while others surely felt disgusted that he didn’t go far enough, that he should start his own faith community instead of maintaining any ties with such a hopelessly corrupt religion.
I came to realize that this wrestling is exactly the work every human must do, to heal our basic, core fears that we are not good enough, not competent enough, not worthy enough of respect.[1] When he equated me with Trump supporters, it felt like a rejection and maligning of my core worth as a human. And that – THAT was the true source of my pain: the feeling that I am inherently bad, incompetent, and deserving of contempt – that feeling, that uncomfortable, painful feeling, was a beautiful, precious teacher.
So I sat with that feeling, and I thought more about Jesus, and about the clergy stretching back generations in my family, back to Cornwall, back to a Celtic blending of Druidry and Christianity, back to Wesley, who rejected punitive shaming and defined sin as woundedness and Grace as healing, back to popular, joyfully wise Pelagius, whose Celtic faith was so mystical, so opposed to the rigid, sexist, fearful dogmatism of Augustine, that power-hungry leaders rejected him as a heretic. Sixteen hundred years ago, Pelagius writes,
Look at the animals roaming the forest: The Divine Spirit dwells within them. Look at the birds flying across the sky: The Divine Spirit dwells within them. Look at the tiny insects crawling in the grass: The Divine Spirit dwells within them. Look at the fish in the river and sea: The Divine Spirit dwells within them. There is no creature on earth in whom The Divine is absent… When Our Maker pronounced that Creation was good, it was not only that her breath had brought every creature to life. Look too at the great trees of the forest; look at the wild flowers and the grass in the fields; look even at your crops. The Divine Spirit is present within all plants as well. The presence of The Divine Spirit in all living things is what makes them beautiful; and if we look with her eyes, nothing on the earth is ugly.[2]
As usual, when life handed me pain and fear, my faith tradition gave me a place to lay my weary head. I found peace in Pelagius’s words… Goddess dwells within me, and I am not ugly, I am beautiful. As beautiful as the birds, and the great trees of the forest, as the wild flowers and the sea. …And… the crawling insects. Hm.
As usual, when I found a place of peace and healing, my faith tradition gave me more work to do. My faith was telling me that I am as beautiful as…. a Trump supporter. Wow. Wow.
I thought about Jesus some more. I thought about how Jesus treated people that other folks held in contempt. Women. Children. The adulteress. The rich man who wouldn’t give his wealth to the poor. The tax collectors— a modern equivalent might be ICE officers, or detention center guards, or sleazy corporate lawyers. Jesus condemned corrupt leaders, and he got angry sometimes on behalf of people who were being oppressed and cheated right before his eyes. But as a rule, the stories of my tradition show Jesus treating the deplorables with honest compassion. Jesus wasn’t into “call out culture,” which can so often arise from our ego-based need to prove that we deserve respect. Instead, Jesus chose “mentor culture.”
As a woman, I find it painful to think about Trump supporters. Trump is such an unrepentant misogynist and sexual criminal, that I want to retreat to a place of self-righteous contempt and insist that other people—allies, men— do all the hard work of treating Trump supporters like human beings. I realize, rationally, that contempt never inspires anyone to learn, grow, and make better choices. If the people who voted for Trump are ever going to change their thinking, that will require mentor culture, not contempt. If we want to fix the misogyny and racism and violence— and have any prayer of saving our planet— that will require putting aside our need for self-righteous dismissal of others. But it’s sooooo painful as a woman, as a rape survivor, to imagine how any decent human could support such a violent misogynist. Then I think about Pelagius, and Jesus, and I realize that I can’t have it both ways. If I am beautiful, they are beautiful. If they are ugly, then I must be ugly, too. After all, plenty of people can’t imagine how I can be considered a decent human, and they struggle to treat me with decency… because I am Christian.
And that’s the central work for all humans: realizing that we are each, to someone, a deplorable. It may feel satisfying to our core fears, if we reject and snidely mock other deplorables, rather than focusing our critique on the actual issues at hand (racism, misogyny, colonialism, ecocide, etc). But if they deserve contempt, then we deserve contempt, too. That Golden Rule… gets me, every blessed time. Maybe that’s why all religions have some version of it: because, while impeccably simple, it is the hardest work in life. So… even if neither of us would ever vote for Trump, …I say this to you. From one deplorable to another: We are beautiful. We are Divine. We are worthy of love. Let’s reject shame. Let’s find healing. Together.
Trelawney Grenfell-Muir teaches courses about Sex, Dating, Marriage, and Work in the Religion and Theological Studies Department at Merrimack College and about Cross Cultural Conflict in the Department of Conflict Resolution, Human Security, and Global Governance at the University of Massachusetts, Boston. A Senior Discussant at the Religion and the Practices of Peace Initiative at Harvard University, she holds an M.Div. from the Boston University School of Theology with a concentration in Religion and Conflict, and a Ph.D. in Conflict Studies and Religion with the University Professors Program at Boston University. She currently writes articles, book chapters, and liturgical resources about feminist, nature-based Christianity.
[1] For more on these three core fears, see Difficult Conversations: How to discuss what matters most, by Douglas Patton, Bruce Patton, and Sheila Heen (Penguin Books, 2010).
[2] –The Letters of Pelagius 71, (Ed. Robert Van De Weyer. Turtleback Books, 1997.) revised to make the language inclusive/female
feminismandreligion.com 
You refer above to Jesus as fighting against a “hopelessly corrupt RELIGION”. In fact, it was that very religion he was fighting FOR – against a corrupt PRIESTHOOD put in office at the direction of Judea’s Roman conquerors.
Nothing Jesus is quoted as having said is not paralleled in either the Hebrew bible or in Rabbinic sources of the period. He seems to have differed from the Pharisees in his strategy and tactics – not his beliefs. They were prepared to work within the system and he was not. In our era you might compare it to the radical left scorning mainstream Democrats as hypocrites (why even waste words on the un-reconstructable Fox news Republicans. Christianity, to which I presume you refer, is product of his disciples – which does not diminish its tremendous value and accomplishments.
Your comment above is an insidious, albeit unintended, back door attack on the legitimacy of Judaism. Frankly, as a Jew, I resent it. Misrepresentations like this provide an opportunity for the misuse of religion by the evil and powerful among us that you rightly castigate earlier in your essay. Please review the facts and clarify your remarks. Thank you.
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Dear Steven,
I am so sorry you heard my statement as me saying that Jesus was fighting against a hopelessly corrupt religion. That is not what I was saying at all. I was saying that there would have been people in Jesus’ time who believed that the Judaism Jesus was critiquing was hopelessly corrupt, and so he should start his own religion rather than trying to reform Judaism. I agree with you completely – Jesus had no intention of leaving Judaism or condemning Judaism at all. He was condemning only a certain group of corrupt leaders who were colluding with imperial domination systems. He was prepared to work within the system of Judaism, though not the system of imperial domination. I was trying to point out that just as some people believe Christian reformers (such as myself) are wrong to stay within Christianity because Christianity is hopelessly corrupt, all religious reformers (and even secular reformers) have experienced some people feeling the same way about what they are doing. My comment was meant as the counterpart to the previous comment, in which some people would have thought Jesus went too far, just as some people believe I go too far – because of my feminism or some other reason – while some people would have thought he did not go far enough, such as my family members who think I should leave christianity in order to have integrity, because no one can be Christian and be an ethical person. Maybe no one ever thought that about Jesus… after all, in those days, religion was not seen as a separate sphere of life the way it is now, in which people just opt out of the faith tradition they grew up in, and choose no faith or a different faith, etc. Back then, faith tradition was more a seamless aspect of culture and reality. But either way, Mark has Jesus implying that his family and hometown friends criticize him and think he is dishonorable. And we also read about some of his disciples criticizing him for letting Mary pour costly ointment on his feet. So he surely had to put up with the same sorts of constant criticisms of every prophet and reformer, from Moses right on down the line, and it comforts me to think that prophets and reformers for thousands of years, from many faith traditions, have had friends and family who denounced them with the kind of contempt I have received. Painful as it is, it comforts me… to think that Jesus saw the beauty and precious worth of Judaism, just as I see the beauty and precious worth of Christianity, despite what some of our contemporaries may say.
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Why did you vote for him? People of color are not only meant to carry the burden of racist policies, hateful words, endure caged babies, but are also obligated to mentor and teach the very people that are hurting them NOW? What do you think they have been trying to do for a couple of centuries?
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Shirl, I must assume you did not actually read the article. I did not vote for Trump, and I address the exact point you are bringing up.
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Thanks for writing this post. You make some excellent points, like we need to “put aside our need for self-righteous dismissal of others.” I’ve been saying for years and years that so-called followers of Jesus the teacher should read, read again, and pay attention to the Sermon on the Mount. I bet Trump and Pence never heard of that sermon. Alas.
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Barbara,
Your reference to the Sermon on the Mount is well taken. Sadly, while Trump likely has not read it, Pence certainly has – and seems determined not to Open his heart & understand it.
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Steven, I believe that neither Pence nor the various fundies who preach and act against practically everyone who doesn’t share their narrow and corrupted views of just about everything have paid the slightest attention to anything Jesus said. They’re all following the nasty, misogynist views of that nasty old man Paul/Saul and the equally nasty old OT prophets. The Christian church may have sponsored some fabulous art back in the medieval and renaissance periods, but today it…well…needs a new reformation and some serious cleansing. Which, no matter that Pope Francis asked the people to pray for him, ain’t gonna happen. Catholic and Protestant–all those men are just too happy with their power and position. And (often) wealth.
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Thank you, Barbara. It is always deeply frustrating when a religion or secular ideology becomes wedded to domination systems, such as the Right Wing in the USA, or Secularism in Turkey, or Communism under Stalin, or Buddhism in Myanmar, etc. To me, it just shows that humans are always prone to seeking power over others, regardless of what framework we use in our attempts to build healthy communities. The Hebrew and Christian scriptures are full of stories of people who tried very, very hard to build healthy communities – and got some things right, and failed, and tried again, and got some things right, and failed spectacularly, and kept trying. I have deep love for the Bible, because in all its messy, flawed, authenticity, it reflects the messy, flawed truth of humans, including me, and if I can love the deeply imperfect people/writers in the Bible, then I can love myself, too. And, I hope, continue to strive and grow, along with reformers of every kind, who want to build a kindred community of JustPeace for all Creation. Peace to you. <3
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I wouldn’t call them an attempt to create ‘healthy’ communities. It’s an attempt to control people who don’t fit in with others’ ideas of what things ‘should’ be like based on fear and ignorance.
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Chris Lynne perhaps you see every community in history as inherently oppressive? From a social science point of view, communities always try to come up with ways to make meaning and understand what is right and wrong. These ideas become expressed in lived behaviors, gatherings, rituals, words, agreements, and structures. Every indigenous community has this sort of attempt to guide and nurture goodness in community, and so do large and industrial societies. In every case, aspects of human nature intrude and cause violence and oppression in various ways. When power imbalance grows, do does oppression and violence. So communities fail to achieve their goals and ideals. All communities. Just like all people fail to achieve their highest selves sometimes. But we keep trying. All of ethics is the study of the difference between “what is” and “what should be” – and how we define those ideas, etc. It’s important and challenging work, always.
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Hi Trewlaney, As I said earlier, I enjoyed this piece. However, in this comment you overgeneralize. Humans are not “ALWAYS prone to seeking power over others, regardless of what framework we use in our attempts to build healthy communities.” As Rodgers and Hammerstein put in _The Sound of Music_, “you have to be carefully taught…” to be racist, sexist, etc. And there are still many matriarchal communities, where the teaching is the opposite, and as a result, they have a much better balance of power, the Mosua of China, the Minangkabau on Sumatra, the Ainu of Japan, the Hopi here in there U.S, and many others. We also know from our own history that there were egalitarian societies in Old Europe, for instance (see Marija Gimbutas).The modern-day matriarchal societies have created egalitarian structures based on a gift economy, the values of “motherhood,” consensus decision-making, and an undergirding value of the common good. When we overgeneralize like this, it leads to pessimism and even cynicism. We can and must teach our children and ourselves better ways to live, and history and anthropology show us that we can.
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Nancy, yes, I did not mean to imply that ideas do not matter. Ideas certainly do matter. Some ideas have more potential to help human individuals and communities find JustPeace than others. I agree with you – egalitarian ideas are very important! Thus, the importance of feminism! What I meant to say is – no matter how good the ideas are, someone, somewhere, will find a way to use them that ends up causing power imbalance, harm, violence, and oppression. So for example, within feminism, we find individuals and communities who end up harming others and behaving with cultural, structural, and direct violence. Certainly there are differences in the levels of violence in different communities, and certainly those differences have to do with the ideas they promote. But there is no magic formula of ideas that will always, everywhere translate into a nonviolent, perfect community. Because humans are just humans, and as wonderful as we are, we will never create the magic formula that inoculates our communities against ever having problems. I’ve seen so many beautiful efforts by brilliant people – people who foreswore religion or christianity or conservatism or whatnot – to create community “the right way” without any of those “bad, violent doctrines” etc. And they eventually end or divide or go through big changes, because the problems that arise are the same problems we always see in all churches, families, schools, offices, hiking clubs, etc… the struggles of being human together in community. So yes, by all means, we must find the best ideas we can find, from within or outside our traditions, whichever we prefer. And we must not complacently think that those ideas will inoculate us against conflict, power imbalance, or violence of various kinds. I was part of a beautiful, beautiful egalitarian community for years. And a passionately justice-oriented person destroyed it with zealous commitment to getting everyone to do justice the way s/he wanted. I’ve seen it over and over. The problem isn’t that Jesus, or Buddha, or Moses, or Muhammad, or Marx just had terrible ideas. The problem is that some of their ideas were so good that they were incredibly popular. And there will always be some people in every community who DO want power over others, and who try to figure out how to get it, even if they think they are doing it for the “greater good.” There will always be fear, and there will always be people who are good at manipulating fearful people by manipulating the idea systems they use. That doesn’t mean we should give up!! On the contrary… it means we must accept that this is our most central human task, and never stop trying to understand and improve our ability to heal fear and nourish peace. I certainly don’t encourage fatalistic pessimism. I just don’t want to see people hurt because every time they think they’ve found the “one perfect community” it turns out to be full of imperfect humans doing the things humans always do. It’s like thinking that if you find the right marriage partner, there magically won’t be any work to do. Communities take work, a combination of healthy ideas and healthy structures/systems, and a continual willingness to do the emotional labor of maintaining wellness.
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Love me some Pelagius. Beautiful quotation. I am a pagan who still talks and listens to Jesus, though i can’t call myself a Christian as I am not part of any Christian faith community. I was raised on the Sermon on the Mount and on the passage in Matthew which requires us to see everyone (and I would say everything) as Christ. I was naked and ye clothed me…I sometimes say to Jesus in exasperation, “you love him/her whoever it is I am having difficulty with. I am not up to it today.” I do pray, often by name, including Trump’s, for people in positions of power to make and enforce policy. I pray for their hearts to open, and I have to open my own heart to do it. It ain’t easy. Christians historically and as a group are responsible for a lot of heinous things, so I understand why people recoil sometimes, though I am still and always moved by people who live by those tough gospel truths. I will confess that I am relieved that you did not vote for Trump. I honor you as a follower of Jesus.
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thanks, Elizabeth, for reminding me of my need to pray for Trum’s heart to open, however ugly he feels to me. It was much easier when it was George W. Bush, who seemed to be at least a real Christian, who possibly was a front for others, who manipulated him.
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Thank you, Elizabeth and Nancy. Elizabeth, just as plenty of feminists say I can’t call myself feminist because I am Christian, plenty of Christians say I can’t call myself Christian because I am – for example – so feminist. I have stopped allowing anyone to tell me what I can or can’t call myself. So far as I’m concerned, that’s up to me. I did used to call myself Christo-pagan, but I found such repeated, violent rejection from pagan communities (because I am Christian), that I eventually gave up. I believe that my heart is really with the pre-Roman, pre-Norman Celtic Christian approach of my ancestral peoples, which did preserve much of British paganism. For example, in my ancestral home Cornwall, people celebrated Easter in the beginning of May, as the turning of the Celtic year to the beginning of the light half of the year. Even after the Celts were forced to submit to the centralized, hierarchical, punitive Roman Christian system, they held on to a lot of their pagan and Celtic ways of thinking – even Karl Barth dismissed Britain as hopelessly Pelagian. John Wesley, founder of Methodism, loved Pelagius. My Cornish grandfather (a Methodist minister) identified as both Christian and Druid.
I really admire you for your prayers. I have prayed for Trump, and Bush, and the 9/11 suicide bombers, and other people I view as deeply broken and terrifyingly harmful. I can do it. But it is hard work. My daughters are better at it than I am. Maybe as children, they see these things more clearly. Most of my praying nowadays involves very few words and involves trees and/or my ancestors altar. Or singing/chanting. I honor you both in your integrity as weavers of the world you want to see. <3
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Trelawney, I honor your personal courage in facing up to the people who would judge you negatively for being who you are.
And this an excellent reminder of how important it is not to be judgemental. In the tradition I studied we worked to have what we called “baby eyes.” That is looking at the world, other people, ourselves as a baby would with that look of wonder and joy in their eyes.
Thank you for writing this.
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Thank you so much, Judith. I love your idea of “baby eyes.” I think about that sometimes – one of my colleagues, an Episcopalian priest and professor, asks, “How did this person’s community let h/er down, before s/he let h/er community down?” People do not grow up in a vacuum. We do have responsibility, yes, but I have no idea what I would be like as a person had I been raised the way Trump (or his supporters) was raised. I might be even more harmful. I’ll never know. When my oldest daughter was three, she used to read a children’s book about the Christmas story, that mentioned King Herod and how he wanted to hurt baby Jesus because he was afraid Jesus would be king instead of him. She used to hug the picture of Herod and talk soothingly to it, and comfort Herod, and tell him he didn’t have to be afraid, and then say, “There, now King Herod won’t try to hurt baby Jesus.” I wonder sometimes if it really is that simple. Maybe if we all actually got the healing we needed for our hurts and wounds, we would stop hurting each other. That would be wonder and joy, indeed. <3
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Ugh, Janet, I apologize for accidentally writing Judith, I know who you are!! I’m sorry for the typo. <3
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Wonderful post, Trelawney. I would have to disagree, however, that everyone has “basic, core fears that we are not good enough, not competent enough, not worthy enough of respect.” I believe those fears are culturally conditioned, and that in our Christo-centric society, the basis for them is “original sin.” This is, of course, compounded by patriarchy for women, who are told from the moment they are born that they are not as good, competent, or worthy of respect as men are. Pelagius is a good counter to Augustine.
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Very interesting point, Nancy. Original sin hasn’t been a widespread or popular belief for very long in human history, and the social science behind the theory of these fears is one that has been used in conflict resolution circles around the world in various cultures, with various belief systems. But I certainly agree with you about the damage done by the doctrine of original sin, and other such violent doctrines. And yes, Augustine was terrified by Pelagius, which makes sense… Augustine’s terror became the lynchpin for the violent and oppressive dogmas of church hierarchies for a very long time… I remember one famous ethicist saying that the church has been living in the shadow of Augustine’s erection for 1600 years… and if anyone has an erection for that long, he should really go see his doctor!
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Wouldn’t it be so easy, if the problem were Christianity? Or Trump? Or “religion”? Or men? Etc. It would be so tidy. Thank you for drawing out some of the complexity and hypocrisy… when we try to label one group or religion as ‘the villain,’ we get to pat ourselves on the back for being in the ‘right team.’
I am also reminded of The Help, when Aibileen tells the little girl she takes care of every day, ‘you is good, you is kind, you is important.’ Everyone needs to believe this, not because we are on the ‘right team,’ but because it’s inherently true regardless of anything else. Whatever helps us understand it, helps us move away from demonizing others – or even having ‘others.’ Maybe it’s different for different people; I think the Creation is a wonderful mentor with which to do this work!
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Thank you, Tallessyn… yes, it seems to me that humanity has this fundamental internal flaw of ingroup, which is – of course – the same as its fundamental internal strength of community – but somehow, when we get our self-worth from our group identities, we become violent. I had forgotten that part in The Help, so poignant. I agree… if we believed that were inherently true, we wouldn’t demonize others or other anyone. I’d love to see you write about how the Creation mentors us this way. <3
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Love the quote from Pelagius. Studying him in grad school in history of doctrine class, I learned only that he was wrong wrong wrong. I recall liking some of his words, but of course never studied him again.
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From what I read, Britain and Ireland never stopped being pretty Pelagian, especially the Celtic areas, despite Southern European elite folks insisting he was wrong wrong wrong. Hildegard of Bingen sounds a lot like this, too. Certainly we weren’t taught much about him in seminary (or about Hildegard, for that matter), and my professor did him terrible disservice, I think. Unfortunately, not much of his written work survives. But as I say, his ideas survive, their influence survives, and to me, studying him has been very nourishing. I am going to try to translate the above quote into Cornish, I think… from what I can gather, he might originally have been from the area between Cornwall and Wales, which was all one Celtic identity group and shared language back then. So even though he wrote this in Latin, I like to think of him speaking about it in something similar to Cornish, 1600 years ago. I think Cornish will capture the essence of this idea better than Latin, anyway, personally.
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I totally understand your difficulty in calling yourself “Christian”. I am a student of “A Course In Miracles” and it has changed my life. And in the books, while it is not explicit, it does appear that the author is Jesus. And so, to follow the teachings of those books, that would surely make me a “Christian”. But most Christians seem to condemn the book as being a heresy, bordering on the occult. Moreover, for me to identify myself as Christian seems very uncomfortable, as it would seemingly identify me with doctrines which I consider extremely dangerous, and, in fact, completely antithetical to everything that Jesus of Nazareth taught.
But thank you for the quotes from Pelagius. I had heard of him but was not familiar with his writings. Now I feel that I need to find out a lot more about him, because I certainly identify with the pieces you quoted!
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Dear Jimmy – I am so glad you found a path that brings you wellness. Labels can be such a challenge for us humans – people make a lot of assumptions about all “Americans” as well. Christianity is a very diverse umbrella. Here is a post I wrote about why I do call myself Christian, despite the way right wing groups have tried to define that label in ways I consider violent. https://feminismandreligion.com/2018/06/01/im-not-proud-to-be-christian-and-no-one-else-should-be-either-by-trelawney-grenfell-muir/
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I wonder what Martin Luther King Jr. would say about this article. As he was a Christian minister as well as a strong social justice advocate, I believe his perspective is crucial in helping to figure out how to account for the barbaric history of the acts of Christianity while also standing for the ideals of peace and forgiveness that it preaches. He would say that his faith is what fueled his drive for justice. And people didn’t attack his Christian faith as much as his determination for social justice. I think if American Christians once again took the forefront in fighting for social justice, there would not be so much mistrust of Christianity right now. But Chrisitians as a whole (not neceasarily you in particular) are either very quiet about justice, or very loud about supporting Trump — so it is hard to have an open/trusting heart toward any Christians right now, due to the company you associate yourselves with. I also love MLK’s line “God told me to love my enemies — that doesn’t mean I have to like them”. He understood that there is evil in this world that needs to be fought againt — not tolerated. But to do it with conviction, knowing that you are on the side of truth, and that it will set you free. I also think it is worth reading about white privilege, and how the relationship between Christianity and white supremacy has shaped where we are in this country right now. This article also makes me think of the US War Veterans who kneeled before the Native Elders and Standing Rock, and apologized for the genocide our country committed against their people. I think if the true Chrisitians in this country who care about social justice don’t want us to recoil in fear and disgust around them, it is vital that they 1) Organize and resist in a massive and public way against all social injustices in this country 2) Take full responsibility for the bloody history that Christianity has left in it’s wake by kneeling before the peoples it has harmed and begging forgiveness in a massive and public way. By taking the name of Christianity, you hold the history with you, whether you like it or not, and 3) Do not get offended when people recoil around them. Instead, Christians need to accept this recoil with understanding, and strive to live up to the ideals of their faith with their actions and their words. Because our recoil is not about you as an individual — it is meant as an outward sign to remind you how far Christianity as a whole has fallen away from being leaders against social justice. It is pivotal information. It is a gift. It reminds you of your heavy responsibility to not let the atrocities of the past repeat again in the name of Jesus. It is a reminder to be sober and watchful. Of course the ego will try to make you feel as if you yourself are being persecuted when people recoil. That is a lie. You are not being persecuted. You, and the organization you associate with (Christianity), are being held accountable in ways it has never been asked to be accountable before. And we are asking you to be better. Christianity has held so much power in this world, that it has never considered kneeling and begging forgiveness in mass, in public, as a whole, toward the peoples it has destoryed. Do not get lost in your sadness about people equating you to Trump supporters. Accept their recoil, understand it, be contrite, and recognize the truth of the wrongs that Christianity has participated in. I am still shocked anyone would be Catholic or associate with the Catholic Church after all of the child molestation that occurred and was covered up for decades. Christianty as a whole has these types of stains on it. These acts demand constant contrition. Give us a reason why we would never wonder if you would be a Trump supoorter. Be humble and grateful that the unchecked power of Christianity is finally being taken to task. It is exactly what the Christian Church needs to come back as a whole to it’s social justice roots. My father is a minister, and a lifelong Democrat. He knows the road to hell is “lined with the skulls of bishops” (Revelation, NRSV), and never flinches when the bloody history of Christianity is invoked, because long ago he accepted his life would be a life of pennance. This pennance brings him closer to God, makes him a leader in his community, and energizes him to take on every social justice issue that comes across his desk. He ain’t perfect, and he doesn’t try to be. He just tries to be sorry every day. And he does it with assurance and love and joy because he knows this act of pennance reflects the love of Jesus onto the world. He doesn’t have time to get hurt or offended when people recoil from his faith. He is too busy helping the world, and staying penitent. He knows he is not the victim — not even for a second. I would be very happy to see more Christians lead a life of pennance. My recoil would at least lessen a bit.
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Susannah, I can respect where you are coming from with your comment. I think maybe you have misunderstood my article, though. The family member who equated me with Trump supporters is well aware that I have dedicated my life to peace and justice, and that it is never something I have been quiet about or complacent about. This person also knows well the history of clergy and Christian leaders who have done the same, in my family. My grandfather, rest his soul, allowed himself to be kicked out of the church he was serving, because he refused to stop inviting black people to the church (this was the 50s). So please don’t misunderstand my article and think that I am saying I am “persecuted” in any way. My sadness came from this person who knows and loves me very well, drawing a personal comparison between me, their beloved family member, and “Trump supporters” generally. That’s not persecution, and I never would have called it such. It’s just a painful comparison.
Secondly, please don’t misunderstand my description of Christianity as any sort of attempt to dodge or excuse the ways it has been linked with and used to justify violence and oppression. One of the things we all learned in seminary at Boston University School of Theology, was that the ways Christianity have been linked with and used to justify violence and oppression are far worse and more widespread than any of us had imagined. People like me, who attend progressive seminaries, know far more about the damage done in the name of religion (and specifically Christianity) than most other people, because it is our responsibility to learn about that.
We also learn about a lot of other things that most people do not learn. We learn about a sociological and psychological study of religion and of oppression, for example. We also learn about the reasons why American Christianity appears to have become so coopted by Right Wing Authoritarian Fundamentalism, even though many millions of American Christians reject that approach and condemn its actions. Have you ever heard of the IRD, the Institute for Religion and Democracy? It is a secular think tank, which has channeled massive amounts of money into silencing and destroying progressive and even moderate American Christianity, and promoting and propping up RWAF Christianity. It was done for secular reasons – corporate greed, etc. The Social Gospel movement in this country used to be a very robust, vocal force politically, which fought hard against injustices and intolerances and affected policies and political movement. So the IRD was formed to intimidate, silence, and undercut that powerful force. I have clergy friends who have experienced their intimidation tactics firsthand, and it is very ugly.
We also learn about the role of media in promoting this narrative of the RWAF Christian as normative. I remember when our country bombed Iraq after 9/11, and droves of Christian leaders and adherents were protesting in the streets of Boston. My sister and I had a huge banner: “Who would Jesus bomb?”. We joined droves of Christians at other times, too, protesting for marriage equality in Massachusetts back in 2003/4 etc, with big banners: “Let my people marry” and “Jesus: the anti-bigot” etc. We were always disheartened by the utter silence of the press, mainstream media, on these occasions. It happened again recently at the Women’s march in Boston – there I was with my big sign, “Jesus is a feminist” – the Boston globe reporter asked me a lot of questions, but never printed or reported a word of it. I could go on and on.
It serves the IRD perfectly to have everyone believe that 1) most Christians agree with RWAF, and 2) the ones who disagree never bother to protest or get vocal in their activism about it. So that is what people believe. Media have done a great job reinforcing those ideas. The number of Christian representatives who have knelt in repentance to oppressed peoples is beyond count. The number of Christian efforts to bring justice and restoration to such peoples and communities is also beyond count. Most of my clergy friends have been arrested numerous times, countless times, for all the protests they lead.
No, Christians certainly are not persecuted. And I am not feeling underprivileged in any way about this. But I do want to counter the oligarchy narrative, because that narrative gets used to reinforce the exact kinds of oppression that all progressives ought to be joining together to heal and liberate. Peace.
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I have experienced a similar out-of-hand rejection because I dared support a policy of our President. You see, I’m a musician, and I work with pop songwriters of many stripes. I committed the cardinal sin of working in the music business of not instantly cow-towing to the groupthink “Orange man bad”.
It IS extremely painful to be rejected by our “beloved enemies”! We don’t even see it coming. We think, “_______ is a liberal, therefore, we can talk about anything.” Since 2016, this has not been the case. I truly mourn the loss of dear friends who have shifted from liberal to progressive because, somehow, honest disagreement and discussion is not tolerated or encouraged. Yet, it seems a healthy part of collaborative relationships.
For example, where would the Beatles land if Lennon and McCartney weren’t men of strong opinions? Would their music have become an iconic voice of the 20th century?
I don’t think so. Real relationships need to be safe spaces to speak one’s heart, and agree to disagree. I feel progressive political correctness is moving us from real relationships to arranged, shame-based ones.
I’m not ashamed of my ideas, and neither should anyone else. Come now, let us reason TOGETHER.
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Thank you for your sincere and heartfelt comment. I personally did not vote for Trump nor support his policies, but my article (did you read it?) tries to make a point that you make – that demonizing people who disagree with us will not actually help change anyone’s mind nor achieve anyone’s policy/ethical goals. I am quite progressive, and I have noticed that in both conservative and progressive circles, there is increasing intolerance of diverse opinions. I do not see shame as a helpful way to think about ourselves. We are all on journeys of learning and growth… I personally hope and pray that your journey leads you to reject Trump’s policies and behaviors, but I wouldn’t ever want to demonize you or vilify you. I don’t even know you. I think that the progressives who DO know you should be trying to stay in relationship with you if possible, if the relationship is one of mutual respect, so that you can indeed discuss your opinions, speak your hearts, and continue to wrestle with the important issues of our day. Peace.
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Thanks for such a thoughtful reply! I did read and enjoy your article. To be honest, I would consider myself more libertarian than anything else. I simply am a fan thinking, and today’s climate is more often concerned with corraling discussion than not. My hope is that we learn to disagree well as a people. All the best!
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All the best to you, as well, and yes, let’s all keep working on learning how to disagree in constructive and compassionate ways, so we can all keep growing and learning from each other. Peace!
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