How much to say in 2024? How loudly to say it?
How helpful is it to publicly oppose the MAGA-Trump movement in 2024? I've been wondering about this and am struggling to come up with an answer I feel much conviction about.
It feels like a lot of people, for a variety of reasons, believe it is necessary to take a vocal stand against the former president and the values and assumptions he represents. The foreboding knowledge of the upcoming election provides more than enough motivation to point out the threat the coming days represent.
I remember feeling these things strongly. During the summer of 2016, I wrote the following.
Christian resistance is what the moment requires. It’s necessary to say that this is a non-partisan resistance because our imaginations have been so diluted that we think only of our vote as a signal of support or opposition. But there are other ways. We might submit our vote to a person who has been the target of the candidate’s hate. We might devote our attention to local candidates whose decisions will impact classrooms and housing. We might, as some of are, begin to think about what resistance will look like after this election. There will be reasons to resist if the candidate is elected- he’s made no mystery of how his policies will ostracize and divide. And if he’s not, there will be a reinvigorated contingency of citizens who have been deputized in their bigotry. This too will require our Christian resistance.
I believe these words as much now, seven years later, as I did then. But I feel little impulse to write something similar today. Why?
In part it's because many, many people, including some white Christians, have found their voices since Trump's election. Back in 2016, it could feel like shouting into the (white) void to point out was was so painfully obvious, that a bully was riding a tide of white resentment to the most powerful office in the world. Now, though, such voices are fairly common.
I'm hesitant to join my voice with these others in part because it can sometimes feel like voicing opposition is less about attempting to change someone's mind than about demonstrating my righteousness to those who are already convinced. And that's another reason I'm slower to say publicly the obvious things about the destructiveness of the former president's rhetoric and policies: I'm not sure how effective it is.
Certainly there are still good reasons to say the true things loudly. Bearing witness to justice is necessary, especially during times when deception and double-speak run rampant. But we should be careful not to mistake necessary prophetic moments with the quieter, longer work of inviting friends and neighbors away from easily manipulated fear.
Here's where I'm landing on the question of publicly opposing the Trump movement in the months ahead. Yes, there will be times when it's important to speak up. Christians in particular have the responsibility to tell the truth no matter the situation. But what will matter more, a lot more in these siloed circumstances, is how we are are actually, materially advancing compassion, mercy, and justice in the communities where we have influence. And this will often involve more quiet listening than public talking, more humble compassion than swaggering conviction, more in-the-trenches organizing than cheap sniping.
How about you? How do you plan on using your influence in the tumultuous days ahead?
The View From Here
Book Update
I sent the revisions off to the publisher early on Thursday morning. Sometime in February I'll get the copy-edited version back to review. It looks like we're aiming for an early October publication date. I'm still not quite ready to share the title. Maybe next week?