Agree with everything this article even though it is frustrating to hear people I know praise the likes of Trump. Your writing is getting increasingly more profound and scholarly. I totally appreciate. Kept it up!!
Thanks so much, Patricia! Yes, it is incredibly discouraging but all the more reason we need to create a counter-movement so people have a clear alternative. We need to be about a different energy and agenda.
John - I greatly appreciate your writing and thoughts. I sometimes read your work and have to ponder things like - what does it mean to be a Christian (and not the GQP kind)? Is it OK to call people out? To be angry? To give up on people? Depending on the time of day, I read your stuff and think "he shouldn't be saying that" and then literally minutes later, I re-read and think "Preach, man - tell it like it is!" All this to say, I'm still trying to learn my way with how/if/when to express my outrage at injustice. Thanks for the example you set.
Hi Igor! I write about this quite a bit. I devoted a chapter to it in my book 'If God is Love, Don't Be a Jerk.'
I am perfectly comfortable with anger, at least as an initial prompt. That is how all activism and social change is born. Seeing the human rights atrocities and the waste of so many lives, we SHOULD be angry. The challenge is to transform that anger into something else: into action that brings change or helps someone or fights injustice. Much of Jesus' work was a response to what I call his "ferocity for humanity." When he turns over the temple tables or calls out the religious/political leaders or speaks about the angers of greed and wealth, he is doing so in defense of other human beings being abused and injured. His motives were never to harm the oppressors but to defend the oppressed. If we can make compassion for hurting people our priority, we can channel our natural anger into something useful.
I agree with what you have written: “We need to live and work and vote for equality, diversity, compassion, love, and justice—not for spite.” Also, I have a cloud of disappoint floating over me that will descend if the finger raisers elect Trump as President November 2024 (whether he’s in jail or not). At that moment freedom, fair play and any fidelity to work for the common good will be frozen and MAGA munchkins will left out, even kept, in the cold. Selfishness will not be cured by Selfishness.
The Trump presidency put us all in a pressure cooker. COVID turned up the heat. What came out of the pot was a very clearly divided nation. I thought the divide was political, but the insights of this article make me realize that the pressure cooker's purpose was that division. People are divided on the intent of their hearts. Never have so many ill-willed people been so united on such an evil purpose. And on the other side, good-hearted people want good will for all. It is a clear separation of sheep from goats.
But among the goats are some lost sheep who still believe the lies, and are enthralled, not out of spite, but indoctrination. They are the little children that have been harmed. My hope is that at some point, they reach a line they won't cross, or they will be forever lost.
Agree with everything this article even though it is frustrating to hear people I know praise the likes of Trump. Your writing is getting increasingly more profound and scholarly. I totally appreciate. Kept it up!!
Thanks so much, Patricia! Yes, it is incredibly discouraging but all the more reason we need to create a counter-movement so people have a clear alternative. We need to be about a different energy and agenda.
John - I greatly appreciate your writing and thoughts. I sometimes read your work and have to ponder things like - what does it mean to be a Christian (and not the GQP kind)? Is it OK to call people out? To be angry? To give up on people? Depending on the time of day, I read your stuff and think "he shouldn't be saying that" and then literally minutes later, I re-read and think "Preach, man - tell it like it is!" All this to say, I'm still trying to learn my way with how/if/when to express my outrage at injustice. Thanks for the example you set.
Hi Igor! I write about this quite a bit. I devoted a chapter to it in my book 'If God is Love, Don't Be a Jerk.'
I am perfectly comfortable with anger, at least as an initial prompt. That is how all activism and social change is born. Seeing the human rights atrocities and the waste of so many lives, we SHOULD be angry. The challenge is to transform that anger into something else: into action that brings change or helps someone or fights injustice. Much of Jesus' work was a response to what I call his "ferocity for humanity." When he turns over the temple tables or calls out the religious/political leaders or speaks about the angers of greed and wealth, he is doing so in defense of other human beings being abused and injured. His motives were never to harm the oppressors but to defend the oppressed. If we can make compassion for hurting people our priority, we can channel our natural anger into something useful.
"His motives were never to harm the oppressors but to defend the oppressed."
John, you just deepened my understanding of the passage. Thank you.
I agree with what you have written: “We need to live and work and vote for equality, diversity, compassion, love, and justice—not for spite.” Also, I have a cloud of disappoint floating over me that will descend if the finger raisers elect Trump as President November 2024 (whether he’s in jail or not). At that moment freedom, fair play and any fidelity to work for the common good will be frozen and MAGA munchkins will left out, even kept, in the cold. Selfishness will not be cured by Selfishness.
The Trump presidency put us all in a pressure cooker. COVID turned up the heat. What came out of the pot was a very clearly divided nation. I thought the divide was political, but the insights of this article make me realize that the pressure cooker's purpose was that division. People are divided on the intent of their hearts. Never have so many ill-willed people been so united on such an evil purpose. And on the other side, good-hearted people want good will for all. It is a clear separation of sheep from goats.
But among the goats are some lost sheep who still believe the lies, and are enthralled, not out of spite, but indoctrination. They are the little children that have been harmed. My hope is that at some point, they reach a line they won't cross, or they will be forever lost.