The Law and Order Lie, Rev. Barber on MLK, A Word to White People
Plus, Trump takes a sermon straight to the face
Hi everyone,
Like we said last week, we’re trying something new here. Jonathan and I are going to alternate writing this newsletter individually. And I’m doing the first one three days after inauguration, so there is certainly no shortage of things to talk about. I know this has been quite a week, but I hope you can find some grace and encouragement here.
What I’m covering this week:
- Don’t let your world revolve around Trump
- That sermon delivered straight to Trump’s face
- How Republican “law and order” messaging is the thinnest of smoke screens
- White People Corner: the sneakiness of Christian nationalism
- Staying grounded with Rev. William Barber on MLK
- A preview of tomorrow’s bonus Shake the Dust episode
- And the registration for our monthly Zoom call for paid subscribers, which is on Monday
Don’t Let Your World Revolve around Trump
Donald Trump and his people have a whole lot more power than they did even a week ago. Not just over our government, but also our media, public discourse, culture, thoughts, and feelings. They’re also using that power far more effectively than in his first term, and receiving far less resistance. So this is my plug for not letting your world revolve around them. Authoritarians are most effective when they can be the center of attention as often as possible, for as many people as possible. When they can devour an entire people’s political, psychological, and spiritual focus.
I don’t mean bury your head in the sand. I don’t mean retreat. Moreover, I know both the far-reaching and cruel effects of Trump’s policies, plus the nature of many people’s work, will require that Trump take up a lot of our mental space. But in the rest of your time, do things you love with the people you love.
On Monday night, I read about the executive orders, the vicious personal attacks, and everything else from Trump’s first day. Because I had to for what I do. During the day though, I did work that had nothing to do with him. I played with my daughter. My wife and I had good, longtime friends over for dinner. We had incredible pizza. We celebrated new things happening in our lives. I think that’s how it has to be. Live as many joyfully Trump-free hours as you can. And reach out to people. Isolation and despair fuel authoritarianism. So connection and hopefulness are resistance. And they will help give you the energy you need for direct, political resistance.
Last thing on this point. I know a lot of you follow us because you are people who follow Jesus, or have in the past. And you are disillusioned about faith in no small part because of Christians’ pivotal role in bringing this administration to power. Still, I want to suggest that part of decentering Trump should be recentering God. The simple reason is I haven’t found a better source of connectedness and hope. And I know people can find their way to that source, even if decades of confusion and church trauma have blocked the path. I’m not saying it’s easy. I’m asking a lot of some of you. I just want to encourage you not to let MAGA Christians take Jesus from you by convincing you that they are following him faithfully. So, anyone for whom it’s currently possible, turn your eyes upon Jesus. Linger there for a while. I pray Trump’s inferno will be a little dimmer when you come back.
That Sermon in Trump’s Face
I will confess I was not as immediately captured as the rest of the internet was by the thoughts that the Episcopal Bishop of Washington D.C. Mariann Edgar Budde delivered at the National Cathedral on Monday. She used the last few minutes of her sermon at the traditional inaugural prayer service to ask Trump, who sat in the front row, to show mercy toward immigrants, LGBTQ people, and others who his policies will harm. She was diplomatic, but direct. And she went viral. I doubted the sermon would accomplish much other than getting people excited that someone said some truth directly at Trump’s face when all he could do was sit there and take it (it did, predictably, make him quite mad). Plus, the first 10-or-so minutes of the sermon consisted of the softer, liberal Christian nationalism I typically hear from mainline leaders who operate in political spaces. But I’ve changed my outlook over the intervening days as something more important than these criticisms crystalized. As time goes on, It’s going to be important to take any and every opportunity we have to tell the truth that this administration is doing enormous damage to people. I don’t actually care how much that truth-telling accomplishes one way or the other. I just want a record: there is a path of mercy. There is the possibility that love can drive politics. Let’s follow the bishop’s lead and say it every chance we get. Who knows, maybe we’ll capture a few news cycles and get on some wannabe dictators’ nerves. But that’s not the point. The testimony itself is all God calls us to do.
‘Law and Order’ is an Excuse for Power Grabbing and Cruelty
I could not possibly comment on every move Trump made this week. So I’ll just pull out one notable takeaway. If you hadn’t done this long ago, kindly dispense with the notion that Republicans (the party at least) care even a small amount about law, order, or public safety. “Law and order” messaging is a smoke screen. Trump feels no compunction dropping the idea the moment it is inconvenient. Some datapoints. Trump directed the DOJ to seek the death penalty in all cases involving killings of law enforcement officers, but also pardoned hundreds of January 6 defendants who attacked law enforcement officers. He criticizes immigrants for bringing drugs into the country, and at the same time pardoned an infamous dark web drug dealer who is a hero to Trump’s libertarian, crypto-bro supporters. Trump is trying to override the meaning of the Fourteenth Amendment’s birthright citizenship provision, hoping the justices he installed will do him a political favor and disregard the Court’s consistent, undisputed reading of the more-than-150-year-old clause’s plain language. Hypocrisy regarding the rule of law is the norm. We should focus efforts on simply documenting it, rather than hoping that appeals to some standard will move Republicans.
White People Corner: The Sneakiness of Christian Nationalism
Hey White people, circle up. I know, I know. It’s not comfortable for anyone when we all gather in a corner like this. We’re definitely getting some looks. But this is important. I need to talk to us. The reactions of a lot of us this week to the dizzying number of aggressively cruel actions from the new administration has been despondency and despair. I will grant us that those reactions are quite understandable. And feelings, quite stubbornly, are what they are, regardless of what we would like them to be. We don’t control them. But we can interrogate them. I would like to gently offer that many of these feelings, as I said on our post-election podcast, have an origin point that is difficult for a lot of us to discuss. The origin is our belief that America is better than this. “This,” we might say, “is not who we are.” We might have known a good deal about our country’s flaws. But our feelings can tell us that somewhere deep in our hearts, we thought we were probably immune to the instability and tenuousness that marks politics in most of the rest of the world. We really didn’t imagine dealing with all this. We have to acknowledge the nationalism there, the hope that our country was in fact better than the rest. And we also have to acknowledge that we learned much of that exceptionalism in church. Or we learned it while pledging allegiance to God and country each morning in school. Or from the million different ways our institutions and leaders tell us that God has blessed this country. It is, in other words, Christian nationalism. It’s the same instinct that fuels Trump and his supporters. Again, not all our feelings have the same origin. But I’m asking us to search for that idol a little more carefully than we might otherwise. Because the feelings it produces get in the way of the work we need to do. Can we all try that self-examination this week? Great, I appreciate it. Thanks for joining me. White people, we are adjourned.
Staying Grounded with Rev. Barber on MLK
On Monday, at the same time as Trump’s inauguration, Rev. Dr. William Barber was giving a sermon at a Martin Luther King Jr. Day event. The message was simple, and directed at all of us who want to follow Jesus during the next four years. This is not the time to give up. But his argument wasn’t that we press on because of the urgency of our political circumstances. Rev. Barber said we keep going because of our identity. The people of God simply are not people who give up. We are “those who persevere unto the salvation of the soul.” As Dr. King understood it, we are people who always move toward glory. So what does that mean we do? I’ll leave you with this quote, and invite you to watch the whole talk, which is only about 20 minutes long. “When you meet hate with love, you can see the glory. When you meet meanness with mercy, you can see the glory. When you meet evil and greed with Sabbath economics and giving, you can see the glory. When you meet lies with the truth, you can see the glory. When you meet treachery with triumph and love, you can see the glory. That’s when you see the glory.”
Shake the Dust Preview
On tomorrow’s bonus podcast, Jonathan and I are talking about what political education looks like in this new media and social environment. We get into what the worldview is behind the changes at Meta, and how it’s misguided. We also give a lot of tips for keeping ourselves informed and thoughtful in a society changing rapidly as more and more of our media companies give in to MAGA’s influence. It’s an important conversation. Don’t miss it!
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