The Republican Party is Destroying Christianity in America
The Bible didn’t teach you how to hate, you did that all on your own
In American politics today, the Republican party has become the home of the ‘Religious Right.’ Evangelicalism and extremism are walking hand in hand, as you can see by the disturbing image of Jesus wearing a MAGA hat in this photo.
Christians used to ask themselves, “What would Jesus do?” and wear bracelets adorned with this slogan to remind themselves to look inside themselves to be more Christlike. However, in recent decades, the ‘church’ has made itself more of a political institution than a religious one.
According to Dan Foster,
In the Evangelical world, whether or not a person was a good political candidate was dependent not on their policies but on their profession of faith — even if the content of their character was at odds with that profession of faith. They merely had to hold up a Bible and stand in front of a church, and they would get the Evangelical vote, much to the chagrin of those looking on. Yes, the more Christian nationalists with the Republican Party push their agenda for a “Christian” nation, the more Christianity is despised, and the less likely they are to ever obtain that which they seek. What is more, they will destroy the church in the process.
I couldn’t agree more. As Christianity endorses political candidates like Donald Trump (who obviously hasn’t read the bible), it is selling its soul for a semblance of political power, in which hateful ‘Christian values’ are preached in politics and from the pulpit.
Jesus didn’t teach us to hate the black community, immigrants or the LGBTQ+ community.
In the gospels, Jesus teaches us to love everyone. When you love someone, that means to treat them with kindness and respect. It means, to treat them as equals.
Jesus told us (Mark 12:31):
The second is this: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no commandment greater than these.”
According to Grace Bible Church:
In response to the lawyer’s second question and his attempt to redefine who qualifies as his neighbor, Jesus tells the parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:29–37). Jesus makes it clear in this parable that our neighbor is anyone around us, regardless of their ethnic, religious, or socio-economic status.
Though this is what Jesus teaches — and one would think that Christianity is based on his teachings — many self-proclaimed Christian Nationalists in the United States don’t base their actions on what Jesus himself tells us is the greatest commandment.
The church has allied itself with the state and forgotten God.
Trump as a soldier of God?
It is astounding to many how someone of so little moral character as the 91-times-indicted former president Donald Trump still manages to keep a strangle hold over the Republican party and the Christian right.
In 2016, the American Organization of Historians, tells us:
Trump combines poor personal behavior (bullying, name-calling, infidelity) with rhetorical dedication to the policy preferences of evangelical voters. In other words, it doesn’t matter how reprehensible one behaves if one toes the rhetorical line. That Trump acts upon evangelicals’ desires on a scale at least equivalent to George W. Bush’s administration adds fuel to the fire of their support. Pro-Trump evangelicals are willing to forgive behavior that would get one kicked out of Sunday School if the leader of their party will articulate their policy priorities — and nominate conservative candidates to the Supreme Court.
Christians sold their souls when they voted for Donald Trump.
As should be clear from his rhetoric and his personal behavior, Trump does not hold himself to the moral standard that has been set out by Christianity for years. However, he did appoint Supreme Court justices who overturned Roe v. Wade. Since Christians have long opposed abortion, this was a huge service to them.
White Christian Nationalism
In the past few decades leading up to Trump’s pandering to White Christian Nationalism, this disturbing movement has been on the rise within the Republican party. The right has moved farther right than it was even 20 years ago.
Now, people openly share bigoted views, emboldened by Trump’s rhetoric.
One respondent in a recent Pew Research study had this to say about Christian Nationalism:
“It’s a view held primarily by straight, White, Christian males that the U.S. should be RULED — as opposed to being GOVERNED — according to their interpretation of the Bible and therefore that women, members of the LGBTQ community, practitioners of other faiths, and people of other races and ethnicities, etc., are inferior beings and should be subjugated and controlled as such.”
I think that pretty well sums it up.
In their own words, Christian Nationalists are telling the rest of us that we are inferior beings to White Christian Men, and that we need to sit back down and learn our place again.
Part of their platform is declaring the United States to be a Christian nation. In a new poll,
It says that 61 percent of Republicans favor declaring the U.S. a Christian nation, but, also, a majority of Republicans understand that doing so would be unconstitutional.
This means, Republicans are willing to put their ‘Christian’ values ahead of the democracy in which we live. They want to institute a theocracy where their misguided, hate-fueled version of Christianity can reign supreme.
Additionally, as evidenced by the Christian imagery that was present during the attacks on the capitol on January 6, 2021, Christian Nationalists are also prone towards violence to achieve their ends. This puts the country in a dangerous position where a power-grab by a few radicals is not only possible but plausible. This is a danger we need to guard against in the future as this radical, fascist group becomes more emboldened.
Forgotten Christian Values
As I said earlier in this article, with the synthesis of White Christian Nationalism into the heart of the Republican party in part because of the rise of Donald Trump, historical Christian values have been left behind.
The values of charity, love and compassion that Jesus taught throughout his ministry have been forgotten.
Jesus said,
38 “You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ 39 But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also. 40 And if anyone wants to sue you and take your shirt, hand over your coat as well. (Matthew 5:38–40)
And,
7 So when they continued asking him, he lifted up himself, and said unto them, He that is without sin among you, let him first cast a stone at her. (John 8:7)
Jesus was a pacifist.
This new, hyper-militant, brand of Christianity isn’t reflective of the teachings of Christ what-so-ever. They have become so entrenched in a socio-political narrative of the ‘rightness of whiteness’ that they are unwilling to let go of the power they feel is being usurped from them by women and minorities.
These self-proclaimed Christian Nationalists have strayed so far from real Christian values that people who believe in following a moral compass that includes helping the poor and the outcasts (as Jesus did!) are leaving the church for fear of being associated with so much hate and bigotry.
According to Open Democracy,
That marriage between conservative, mostly white Christianity and a Republican Party gleefully trampling the rights of queer people and women seems unlikely to end any time soon. And so long as that continues, we will probably continue to see empathetic Americans who grew up Christian deciding they no longer care to be religious in increasing numbers.
What it means to be a Christian in America has changed, and with this change, people are increasingly becoming disenfranchised from the church.
