Evangelical Christian leader Russell Moore revealed this week that many evangelical pastors have become alarmed that their Trump-loving congregants have become so militant that they are even rejecting the teachings of Jesus Christ.In an interview with NPR, Moore said that multiple pastors had told h…
I’m not surprised. I’ve heard stories as far back as 2015 or 2016 about people storming out in the middle of their pastor’s sermon because the pastor directly quoting Jesus’ sermon on the mount was too “woke.”
Mark my words: if conservatives can no longer advance their cause under the guise of Christianity, they won’t abandon conservatism. They will abandon Jesus.
This is an extremely interesting thought experiment, and one that is not without precedent. I left a comment below about the misrepresented and often repeated claims regarding Hitler’s (as well as the Nazism more broadly) views on religion, occultism, and atheism.
I bring this up again here because what happened in Germany was essentially the opposite of the proposition you are suggesting. Instead of throwing Jesus out of Christianity, Hitler made a specific and distinct push to remove any perceivedly Jewish teachings from what became German “Positive Christianity”. This included the removal of the Old Testament, the Pauline epistles, and the framing of Jesus as a dogmatic Aryan ideologue who opposed the teachings of Jewish mysticism.
The notion that the modern crypto-fascist & christian-nationalist movements might take the opposite approach by throwing out or obfuscating the teachings of Jesus which they perceive as liberal or socialist in nature and therefore counter to the authoritarian hegemony they seem to be advocating for is a fascinating proposition. I also happen to believe you are correct, and that we have been seeing this happen in real time over the last several decades at least.
I am sincerely afraid that the most damaging threads of the 20th century will be repeated again, and I’m not so sure that humanity is as prepared as it should be to fight against that potentiality. The destruction of education in this country, and the tears in the facade of infinite-growth-capitalism have made the United States the perfect hotbed for this kind of ideology to rise again…
I am sincerely afraid that the most damaging threads of the 20th century will be repeated again
Looks at Uyghur camps in China
No country joined WW2 to liberate the Jews. No one is going to fight China for the Uyghurs. These are atrocities that help sell the morality of a war fought for other reasons. Defeating the Nazis was certainly a moral victory and they were a great evil, but that’s not why we fought them.
No one is coming to the rescue of the Uyghurs. Enduring sanctions is likely to be the worst consequence China faces.
While not the worst consequence, there’s also been a great destruction of culture.
Japan and Korea have been becoming more popular on the world stages, where they’re celebrated for anime and pop songs. Meanwhile, for all its money, and all its genuinely rich and interesting history, entering a forum to announce you’re Chinese might end up prompting snarky responses like “Oh hey, do they give you your own Uyghur family to treat as slaves?”
They won’t think they’re abandoning Jesus. They will start worshipping some different badass with the same name who brings vengeance upon his enemies with swift application of firearms. They’ll call that entity Jesus, but it will have no relationship to the Christian concept of Jesus.
Republican Jesus has been a thing for a long time.
Supply side Jesus. A classic.
That link is to something different, but yes, Supply Side Jesus should be required reading for this thread. It’s a bit dated, though.
https://www.beliefnet.com/news/2003/09/the-gospel-of-supply-side-jesus.aspx
Well, that’s what religious people have always done. They follow a religion until it disagrees with them, then they leave and start a new ‘slightly different’ branch which agrees with them.
You know, sort of like how Catholicism was founded about 30 years after Jesus’ assumed death date, but then 1600 years later, Baptists decided to branch off create their own flavor.
Bruh. They abandoned “conservatism” and jesus a long, long, long-ass time ago.
I suggest you check out the Conservapedia Bible Rewrite project/Conservapedia Bible Project for a good laugh.
…did the pastor just wake from a 6 year coma?
‘Christians’ switched to Cult-45 the day Trump entered into politics.
I grew up fundamentalist, and they had abandoned his teachings in the 80’s in service to Emperor Reagan.
I mean, really, when did Christians ever follow Jesus’ teachings considering how many people were converted by the sword…
It’ll be the ones you don’t hear about, for example my grandparents who are some of the kindest, most compassionate people you’d meet. They hosted refugees, consistently voted progressive, and changed church when their previous one started being more anti-LGBT. There’s just no headlines in Christians actually acting like Christians.
they need to break out a whip and turn over some tables!
I think they’re a bit past those days!
If my kin are anything to go by, youre never too old to kickass and take names. Hell my great grandfather won his first bout against death, lost the second though.
Because they’re actually following the teachings of the Bible especially the notes on the hypocrites. They just do good, they don’t talk about doing good in places where people will hear them.
Good on them :)
Christians have ignored the teachings of Jesus from the start. Just one example: You cannot serve God and money. Matthew 6:24. I think Jesus was a communist who would probably also be crucified today by the people who proclaim to be Christians.
Paul derailed the Church right out of the gate. Here’s a guy who has had an absurd amount of control over the fate of Christianity who never met Christ, and who advocates principles that directly contradict Christ’s own teachings while being very similar to the teaching of the Jewish temple Paul previously held power in as a Pharisee. Paul took Christ’s teachings and merged them into a contemptible, incoherent hybrid of Christ’s message and the Jewish law-focused faith, brought full circle back into a religious bureaucracy by the Roman Catholics.
Total agreement. His message was revolutionary.
The leopard is still hungry
No one hates Jesus and his teachings as fiercely as a Christian. Christians would be the firsts in line to crucify Christ for his hippie, soft ideas again if he were to resurrect, this has been known for centuries.
I have a 20 year old t-shirt that says “If Jesus comes back we’ll kill him again” on it in tiny white script. People always thought it was a statement of my intentions but it was always just a comment on society.
Reminds me of the South Park ep Hare Club for Men, when Bill Donahue, of the Catholic League (read: assholes with persecution complex), says to kill the Jews (Jesus was Jewish). Jesus wasn’t hardline enough.
I’m pretty sure that killing Jesus is not very Christian.
That’s simply not true. A truthful statement is that these people were never Christians. They flew the Christian flag because it lent them credibility and control. But it has been a long time since we’ve seen any Christian values from the loudmouths we see in the news claiming to be Christians. Actual Christians aren’t the people you see on the news. I know a few and they’re great people who do a lot for their communities and the people around them.
A truthful statement is that these people were never Christians.
This is like the most very basic “No True Scotsman” that you can do.
These people are Christian, whether you like it or not. You don’t get to decide that they aren’t. All Abrahamic religions and their holy books are full of awful awful stuff. And no, not just the Old Testament.
Now you know how most Muslims feel.
Yea saying they’re not Christian is just giving them an excuse.
If you’re not at least attempting to follow the teachings of Christ, then you’re not a Christian. Just calling yourself something doesn’t make you that thing. I can say I’m a Rock Star until I’m blue in the face, that doesn’t change the fact that I’m not even musical.
What you’re missing is that your rational response doesn’t let people feel justified in hating people
You know, like atheists think religion makes you act. Turns out that’s a humanity thing and not a religion thing
Not a true Scotman. Read a history book. Christians have been beheading, slaving and murdering people ever since Constantine converted in his death bed. It was never about being a good Christian in the eyes of God. Religion has always been about power.
“I never thought the leopard would eat MY face.” These people got in bed with quite possibly the most godless person on Earth, Trump is very likely one of the first true Atheist Presidents we’ve ever had. He’s probably paid multiple women for sex and abortions, cheated on all of his wives, lies on a constant and regular basis, and is just generally a shitty person on every level. This is the person they hitched their wagon to to get Roe v Wade overturned. I sure as hell hope it blows up in their face.
I think it already is blowing up in their face, and agree fully with your sentiment. While atheists dont depend on religion to define their morals, they get the opportunity to self-define their morals. A narcissistic egotisticial born-with-a-silver-spoon person like Trump is a wolf in sheep’s clothing parading as one of them. He decays or corrupts everything he touches, and the GOP and evangelical Christians have been rubbing all up on him for 7 years. Both groups are in crisis these days.
The GOP has no true platform beyond revenge politics, and the churches are bleeding congregation members… people leaving either because they aren’t on board the crazy train of their church peers or leave because they’ve allowed their beliefs and morals to twist out of whack in conflict of scripture.
Not only that, but all of that was well known prior to him winning the election.
They don’t care.
it’s not that he’s athiest - he still firmly believes in a God and a Supreme Being™, it’s just that he sees himself in the role…
All that immoral behavior you mentioned reads much more like the behavior of an outspoken conservative Christian rather than an atheist. You know, all the “rules for thee but not for me” type stuff.
It may be true that neither of them really believe deep down, but only one is using it to look good while being shitty.
He’s not wrong. But what he’s leaving out is that all this is very rich coming from him personally, a bit of too little too late when he was actually well-placed in 2016 to make a real stand.
It is true that Russell Moore has been speaking out to some extent against Donald Trump for years. But it is also true that when it would have counted most, during the 2016 campaign season, Moore walked back the strength of his anti-Trump statements in order to keep his highly-positioned job as president of the internal ethics board of the Southern Baptist Convention (an organization I consider to be deeply corrupt anyway):
On June 1, 2013, Moore became President of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission, the Southern Baptist Convention’s official entity assigned to address social, moral, and ethical concerns. . . . [Three years later,] Moore’s vocal criticism of then-candidate Donald Trump during the 2016 election season drew a backlash from fellow Southern Baptists, triggering a crisis in which more than 100 churches threatened to withdraw donations to the denomination’s Cooperative Program in protest of Moore’s stances and leading to calls for his resignation. After Moore issued statements of apology in December 2016 and March 2017 for “using words… that were at times overly broad or unnecessarily harsh,” Southern Baptist leaders affirmed their support for his leadership and he remained in his post. (Wikipedia)
It’s hard to call upon the rules and be taken seriously when you have not taken the rules seriously yourself:
“No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and wealth." – Jesus
EDITED TO ADD: I am not a Christian myself, just comparing idolatry to idolatry here.
I like messiahs who weren’t crucified.
You helped create these people. You are these people.
Shouldn’t he be like the false prophet they warn themselves about? I mean, is not that I expected some of those dumbfucks to even know what the bible says, but fuck, the level of idolatry is astounding.
Trump embodies every single characteristic that the Bible ascribes to the antichrist. CPAC even built a golden idol of trump a few years ago.
Hmm, that wasn’t fun at all!
how do they not see that. What would take a literal money exchange booth in the church.
This pastor seems to think so.
I am not a Christian, and don’t have a dog in this fight.
Well, clearly Jesus is the actual false prophet, because a long-haired dark-skinned Middle Eastern socialist who got executed as a criminal sounds like a LOSER.
Maybe the origin of their beliefs has less to do with the meanings being sacred texts, and more to do with being walking, breathing, confirmation bias machines.
The last true Christian was a Middle-Eastern socialist Jew.
Peter?
Santa?
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They like the “is Lord” part. The idea of divine royalty and unquestioning loyalty. They aren’t so keen on teachings of kindness, introspection, self awareness, caring, mutual respect, humility, poverty, etc.
It’s kind of weird to accept someone as your Lord white disobeying all his instructions.
In the 30+ year old words of Bill Hicks:
They believe the bible is the exact word of God - Then they change the bible! Pretty presumptuous, huh? “I think what God meant to say…”
Moore also said that one problem is that many Christians simply feel alienated and lonely, as politics have come to take over the community outlets that churches once held.
Oh, hey, it’s basically me. There isn’t room for “love your neighbor as yourself” in the Republichristian party. I don’t feel welcome at church anymore.
You’re at the wrong church then. A good one can be hard to find in some areas…
Sounds like you should find a new church then.
The golden calf strikes again
Would be interesting to see what reaction one would get to “Trump is Lord” posters.
Ofc they did.
I find it absurd that evangelicals support Trump so hard. A man who is quite literally the exact opposite of what they are asked to be in scripture. He throws them a couple of pieces of red meat and they dive on it. How sad.
Christianity was never about following scripture, it’s always been about using scripture to maintain power over others. If a personis going to put christians in that position of power, they’re going to follow that person, simple as that.
Authoritarians don’t vote for other authoritarians, they vote for charismatic strongmen who don’t share their political beliefs. It’s literally crazy.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right-wing_authoritarian_personality
“Charismatic”
Uses two tiny hands to feebly bring a bottle of water to his mouth while blabbering incoherently. Such charisma!
Christianity has always been a very comfy place for the worst people.
I’d just like to sit in on the closed door leadership meetings where they admit they think Paul masterfully hijacked the gospels and grew Christianity into a tool for oppression. Then divise ways to fuck over their own congregations.
Almost as if they never gave a shit about Jesus’s teachings in the first place and only cherry picked a couple of things that fit their existing desires.
Now they’re just going mask off.
It doesn’t take much. For starters “Greed” is one of the 7 deadly sins…
