In this newsletter post, a reply to a friend troubled that a close Christian friend backs Trump and JD Vance, the author draws on his father's partisanship and on Old Testament teaching. He argues that Christians should neither fuse with nor cut off politically opposed loved ones, but practice differentiation with humility. He also contends that the Bible commands love of foreigners, that nationalism and exceptionalism are dangerous, and that Trump's supporters have been duped.
Reviewed
Its text teaches none of the positions Doxa lists.
Partisan loyalty, such as straight-ticket voting and reliance on partisan media, produces blindness to a party's leaders' flaws and monologue and name-calling in place of dialogue.
Many Christians misunderstand Jesus because they do not understand Judaism; the Old Testament law is the context for Jesus' commandments, including love of neighbor.
The Old Testament commands Israel to love the foreigner as themselves, and the notion of "neighbor" has been interpreted in hierarchical ways that justify chosenness and an order of loves.
Christian history is full of disobedience to the laws demanding social justice, which brought divine judgment even though God long tolerated it.
The present generation is turning away from biblical moral guidelines, justifying evil against women, orphans, the poor, and the disenfranchised and asserting arrogant exceptionalism like the Jerusalem elite in Jeremiah's day.
God has made no covenant with America or its presidents, and nationalism in any form, including Christian, is an exceptionalist religion.
Trump supporters have been duped by political persuasions of the kind that have scapegoated outsiders throughout history, and Trump and his followers are unoriginal and do not know what they do.
Withdrawing from political dialogue with family and speaking only cautiously when asked is a form of complicity and a failure.
Christians who have trouble with a close friend's politics should practice differentiation, staying in relationship through polarizing conversations and avoiding both fusion with the other's views and cutoff from the person.
The right posture toward a politically opposed friend is humility, curiosity, and forbearance, without arrogance or hypocrisy.
No comments yet.