Expediting Our Family's Demise
On baptismal waters compromised by nationalist fantasies
One of the most startling revelations of the past three months has been the extent to which many American Christians will ignore or even celebrate the demise of other Christians.
Consider the Afghan Christians whose protected status was revoked by the presidential administration and who, upon their return to Afghanistan, “will be tortured and killed.” Or the Haitian Christians whose legal protection has also been removed by the administration. “Everybody is just trembling,” said one Ohio pastor of Haitian descent. “Everybody was deceived, everybody lives in uncertainty because they cannot go back home, because back home, there is a legion of gangs who chase them out.” Or the asylum seekers from Iran and China, Christians whose return to their home countries would place them at immense risk, who’ve been detained and deported to Panama and destined to “be sent to a camp at the edge of a jungle called the Darién Gap” where Dengue fever is a common threat. Or the Palestinian Christians whose invisibility to the administration and the Christians who support it leaves them vulnerable to settler violence and the loss of generational land. “We need the U.S. Christians to understand what is happening,” says one of these harassed Palestinian Christians. “We are also people.” Or the mother who laments her husband’s disappearance to the notorious CECOT prison in El Salvador, assuring her husband that, though most American Christians have looked away, “God hasn’t forgotten about you.” Or the more than 10 million Christian immigrants in the USA who are susceptible to deportation or the 7 million USA citizen Christians who live with someone who is at risk of deportation.
Whether ignoring the blatant violence committed against fellow Christians by our country’s allies, turning away from persecuted Christians whose very lives are jeopardized by our country’s rejection, or supporting the administration’s blunt policy of mass deportation, many American Christians are consistently siding with the deadly policies of their country over loyalty to their Christian sisters and brothers. The waters of baptism which are meant to bind disparate people have been compromised by nationalism, racism, and xenophobia.
Haven’t previous policies of the American government also harmed domestic and international Christians? Certainly, but two things make this moment distinctly heartbreaking. First is the forceful retreat from initiatives like PEPFAR – estimated to have saved 26 million deaths from AIDS – which were built on deeply Christian principles of compassion, love, and justice. Second is how the administration’s very anti-Christian policies and political aims are consistently and gaudily draped with Christian language and symbols. The ways the presidential administration is acting violently against Christians in the name of Christ, with the gleeful support of many believers, is an assault against the vulnerable Body of Christ.
To state the situation plainly, in a battle waged against poor, vulnerable, and marginalized followers of Jesus, many American Christians have allied themselves with the forces of oppression and against the well-being of their siblings in Christ.
What do we do with this horror? How do we act when the Body of Christ is treated with such disdain? In addition to prayers laced with lament, grief, and anger, choosing to remember can help us find our way through these terrible days. I remember Frederick Douglass distinguishing between the “pure, peaceable, and impartial Christianity of Christ” and the “slaveholding religion of this land.” I remember Ida B. Wells, reporting on yet another lynching and commenting that “American Christianity heard of this awful affair and read of its details and neither press nor pulpit gave the matter more than a passing comment.” I remember, in other words, that there is a long tradition embedded within American Christianity – within white American Christianity – of selecting solidarity to nation and race over the People of God.
When it comes to majorities of American Christians ignoring or approving the destruction of their fellow Christians, there truly is nothing new under the sun.
Remembering this awful fact helps me not because it leaves me trapped within the confines of a small and frightened faith, a religion defined by nationalist anxieties and racist fears. No, remembering helps me because it redirects my attention away from the apologists of that old slaveholding religion and to the many faithful saints who’ve always persisted in the shadows of racial supremacy and nationalist fantasies. Remembering that state violence and death in this country have always been cloaked in a shabby veneer of Christianity helps me follow those faithful disciples who’ve never been fooled by the propagandists in pulpits.
Let’s not pretend that these days are any less awful than they are. Truly, we are living through a desecration worthy of prolonged and impassioned lament. But let our lament be informed by the memory of the courageous followers of Jesus who, then as today, remind us that the pure and peaceable way of Jesus is still available to those who would seek it.
(Photo credit: Nayib Bukele.)
The Race Against Gun Violence
If you’ve read this newsletter for a year or more, you know that this is the time when I come to you, hat in hand, asking for your financial support as I raise money for New Community Outreach through the Race Against Gun Violence. This is our biggest fundraiser of the year and your generosity will help us serve the young people in our neighborhood through our restorative justice programming. If you’ve appreciated anything about my little newsletter, would you consider a small donation? Thank you!
The View From Here
Easter Sunday is always my favorite day of the year, and this past Sunday was no different. He is risen, indeed! I hope it was a great Resurrection Sunday for you too.