“I am feeling a sense of dread as I contemplate a Trump-dominated 2024.”
So said Dr. David Gushee, professor at both Mercer University and the Free University of Amsterdam.
He is responding to the question, “Given all that is happening with the 2024 election, Trumpism, and the reality that he and his MAGA movement are an existential danger to the country, how are you feeling?”
Gushee continued: “I am preparing myself for 2024 like a person who is facing a grave spiritual, emotional and moral challenge, with a very limited sense of agency and no control over the outcome, but with responsibilities that I am trying to discharge faithfully.”
I say Amen to Dr. Gushee (who has been a guest in TheMeetingHouse). He speaks not only for himself and for me but for thousands, even millions, of citizens in the United States who confess Jesus as Lord and Savior.
Trump is a recent addition to the Culture War coalition that began a half century ago. It was launched as an anti-federal government movement after that government forced the integration of schools in the American South. “Segregation forever” Alabama governor George Wallace famously said, and his people created a vast network of segregation academies in an effort to circumvent the directive of the Supreme Court.
Governor Wallace later repented, but the populist pushback he represented rejected their own southern President (Jimmy Carter), took over the Southern Baptist Convention and then the Republican Party, and embraced Donald Trump when he appeared on the national ballot. They put him in office in 2016 and are determined to do it again in 2024.
The drama between now and then is what Dr. Gushee is referring to when he speaks of “all that is happening.”
Gushee is, of course, concerned about the threat to the nation, and I share his concern. But equally sinister to me (and him) is the reshaping of American Christianity. Trump now is the poster boy for the coalition of white, baptized people who are fearful of the future they see coming. We call them Christian nationalists because they wave the Christian flag, employ Christian vocabulary, and appeal to the double deceit that, one, the country was founded as a Christian Nation, and two, the 2020 election was stolen from Trump.
Data shows that the core constituency of this movement is not nearly as religious as its name implies; the majority are not regular church people. Data also shows that these Christian Nationalists (perhaps one quarter of the population) are closely aligned with the gun owners (about one third of the population).
Which is why their threats about a new civil war are taken so seriously by law enforcement people across the country. Many observers consider the January 6 Insurrection a foretaste of what can happen if Trump loses again to Joe Biden. And on that day just one year ago, we all remember, Christian flags were marching side by side with AK-47s surging behind the banners that proclaimed, “Jesus is my Savior, Trump is my President.”
Add to this extraordinary national moment the 91 charges that are pending against Trump in state and federal courts around the country. It is going to be a year like none other, full of danger and drama, political battles and legal battles, and threats of stolen elections and retaliation. It will be enough to make 2024 a far more memorable year than the fictitious 1984 ever was.
Through it all, Christian leaders and their people will seek a way to rescue the Faith from the fortunes of political intrigue, to protect our religion from the corruption that is being forced upon it, and to equip all of us to resist the siren call of Nationalism while investing our lives in the wellbeing of our nation, our state, and our city.
The struggle for authentic Christian faith and practice is, for me, more important than the fight for democracy, freedom, and the survival of the United States. The MAGA movement and its marriage to white evangelical religion in America is an over-arching threat to Way of Jesus.
Near the end of his interview, Gushee asserts this about this distorted version of Christian faith and practice: “This is Christianity as inflected or infected by whiteness (e.g., a worldview of white supremacism), conquest, colonialism, genocide of the Indigenous populations and enslavement of Africans. “White” equals American equals Christian equals nationalism equals goodness only in this frame.”
Gushee is a powerful voice for truth and justice in the Christian world today. I commend him; I commend his recent book Defending Democracy from its Christian Enemies; and I commend you to this interview published HERE in Solon magazine.
Dwight A. Moody
2024
“I am feeling a sense of dread as I contemplate a Trump-dominated 2024.”
So said Dr. David Gushee, professor at both Mercer University and the Free University of Amsterdam.
He is responding to the question, “Given all that is happening with the 2024 election, Trumpism, and the reality that he and his MAGA movement are an existential danger to the country, how are you feeling?”
Gushee continued: “I am preparing myself for 2024 like a person who is facing a grave spiritual, emotional and moral challenge, with a very limited sense of agency and no control over the outcome, but with responsibilities that I am trying to discharge faithfully.”
I say Amen to Dr. Gushee (who has been a guest in TheMeetingHouse). He speaks not only for himself and for me but for thousands, even millions, of citizens in the United States who confess Jesus as Lord and Savior.
Trump is a recent addition to the Culture War coalition that began a half century ago. It was launched as an anti-federal government movement after that government forced the integration of schools in the American South. “Segregation forever” Alabama governor George Wallace famously said, and his people created a vast network of segregation academies in an effort to circumvent the directive of the Supreme Court.
Governor Wallace later repented, but the populist pushback he represented rejected their own southern President (Jimmy Carter), took over the Southern Baptist Convention and then the Republican Party, and embraced Donald Trump when he appeared on the national ballot. They put him in office in 2016 and are determined to do it again in 2024.
The drama between now and then is what Dr. Gushee is referring to when he speaks of “all that is happening.”
Gushee is, of course, concerned about the threat to the nation, and I share his concern. But equally sinister to me (and him) is the reshaping of American Christianity. Trump now is the poster boy for the coalition of white, baptized people who are fearful of the future they see coming. We call them Christian nationalists because they wave the Christian flag, employ Christian vocabulary, and appeal to the double deceit that, one, the country was founded as a Christian Nation, and two, the 2020 election was stolen from Trump.
Data shows that the core constituency of this movement is not nearly as religious as its name implies; the majority are not regular church people. Data also shows that these Christian Nationalists (perhaps one quarter of the population) are closely aligned with the gun owners (about one third of the population).
Which is why their threats about a new civil war are taken so seriously by law enforcement people across the country. Many observers consider the January 6 Insurrection a foretaste of what can happen if Trump loses again to Joe Biden. And on that day just one year ago, we all remember, Christian flags were marching side by side with AK-47s surging behind the banners that proclaimed, “Jesus is my Savior, Trump is my President.”
Add to this extraordinary national moment the 91 charges that are pending against Trump in state and federal courts around the country. It is going to be a year like none other, full of danger and drama, political battles and legal battles, and threats of stolen elections and retaliation. It will be enough to make 2024 a far more memorable year than the fictitious 1984 ever was.
Through it all, Christian leaders and their people will seek a way to rescue the Faith from the fortunes of political intrigue, to protect our religion from the corruption that is being forced upon it, and to equip all of us to resist the siren call of Nationalism while investing our lives in the wellbeing of our nation, our state, and our city.
The struggle for authentic Christian faith and practice is, for me, more important than the fight for democracy, freedom, and the survival of the United States. The MAGA movement and its marriage to white evangelical religion in America is an over-arching threat to Way of Jesus.
Near the end of his interview, Gushee asserts this about this distorted version of Christian faith and practice: “This is Christianity as inflected or infected by whiteness (e.g., a worldview of white supremacism), conquest, colonialism, genocide of the Indigenous populations and enslavement of Africans. “White” equals American equals Christian equals nationalism equals goodness only in this frame.”
Gushee is a powerful voice for truth and justice in the Christian world today. I commend him; I commend his recent book Defending Democracy from its Christian Enemies; and I commend you to this interview published HERE in Solon magazine.
Dwight A. Moody
2024
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