I think this piece wildly misunderstands the reason why white conservative Christians (Evangelicals in particular) need to pretend Trump is Christlike and why they’re so hateful toward women and minorities.
They believe in a bastardized version of Christianity that’s reverse engineered from their biases. It does not teach compassion but gives them permission to judge people they don’t like and punish them for deviations from conservative norms. It has never been rooted in service to others
The proposition Liz makes, which does strike me as a wishcasting, is that these people totally reform their understanding of Christianity which they have no desire to do and won’t do.
Instead they cherry pick and misinterpret Bible verses that give them permission to harm others. When they talk about freedom, they mean freedom to do harm and control others, not individual freedom to make your own choices. If they didn’t they’d view bodily autonomy, for example, as sacrosanct.
The kind of Christianity they practice is uniquely American, socially regressive, and conflates a jingoistic and shallow Patriotism with a god ordained national destiny
It’s not Christianity in any real theological sense, and the kind of compassionate Christianity Liz talks about has zero appeal for them. It would strip them of their self righteous determination to punish others for perceived sins and would require sacrifices they don’t want to make
I don't know about this... can you point to a time in history when an explicitly Christian society lived up to these ideals? Otherwise it feels like a No True Scotsman fallacy. From the outside, it looks like internecine religious disagreement 🤷🏻♀️
I think the notion of a “Christian society” is a fallacy. Christianity in its roots was about personal choices, not the imposition of moral or lifestyle standards on others or on society. Kindness, selflessness, generosity, humility—it was all about introspection and the creation of a better self…
It's not that Christianity isn't societable, it's that the society it works for is not a worldly one, and not one of this life. Christian Nationalists are obsessed with worldly power of the here and now in a way that is deeply un-Christian.
It isn’t “societable” in any way that is meaningful to any discussion of human societal constructs, so I’m not sure why you think that observation about some heavenly kingdom is relevant here.
The entire context here is human society in this universe. Discussions of what eternal life might look like are way outside the point here. You seem to think it was important to defend Christianity as a societable framework.
I mean, I think the overarching theme here is "ways Christian Nationalists act that run directly counter to widely accepted teachings of Christianity," and I was just pointing out that "my kingdom is not of this world" is definitionally not something they believe in.
