Saturday, October 3, 2020

Authority And Power Trump Good.

A common refrain over the last four years has been, "I just don't see how Christians can follow someone like Trump. It completely contradicts what they believe about Jesus."

While I agree with the sentiments about Jesus - the current president is the opposite of the Sermon on the Mount - I'd offer that conservative Christians are actually acting based precisely on how they believe. I am certainly not speaking about all conservative Christians, but many for sure.

Christians who interpret the Bible literally have been taught to respect the authority of "God". Because of this authority, they justify God drowning (almost) the entire population of the Earth with a great flood - men, women, children, babies, animals, etc. They've been taught to justify God ordering the Israelites to brutally kill adults and children in Jericho (Joshua 6) or commanding the murder of Amalekite adults and children in 1 Samuel 15. God made them, so He can do whatever He wants with them, right? They sinned (forget about the good they've done), so they deserve violent death, right? There are many other examples as well through Scripture.

Why would Christians either create justifications for God reportedly doing these things, or simply defer to his authority? Because it's in their interest. They can keep their "keep out of Hell" card, or believe there is a strongman somewhere in the universe, or believe they have a spiritual parent to take care of them. And they can keep the authority of the Bible which comforts them - something seemingly concrete to lean on. So when something good is attributed to God, then they praise God as good. When something bad is attributed, it becomes "we can't understand with our limited human morality. We must respect God's authority."

Obviously any God would almost certainly be beyond our complete understanding, but we are talking about an inconsistent application of credit here (and a systematic way to justify evil). If God is beyond, then we can't attribute good or evil. Only power. If God is within our ability to morally understand, then we must use that sense of morality (often called "natural law" for Christians) consistently. This is one reason why many Christians see the Bible as a human attempt to understand God, rather than as a perfect revelation from God. Our human nature, in all its glory and horror, is revealed therein.

So when an authority - our current president perhaps - is perceived to be acting in the interest of conservative Christians, many are quite willing to do the same moral maneuvering they've always done for God. It's in their interest, they think, and it's nothing new.

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