An interesting take by Spencer Klavan… hey, we have the same last name! Cool.
I’m starting to think Trump’s ideology might represent the actual opposite of Christianity.
Here’s what I don’t mean by that. I don’t mean that Trump is such a meanie and my sweet, precious Jesus would never tolerate all that yelling. Reports of Christ’s niceness have been greatly exaggerated. Flip through the gospels and you’ll find a much rougher, scrappier character than you may have been led to expect–upending tables, talking back to his mother, fiercely vituperating his best friends. The use of the term “Christian” to mean “cuddly” is one of the more distasteful banalizations of that word in American popular culture. “Unchristian” isn’t a synonym for “uncouth.”
No, my problem is that Trump’s worldview is pretty much diametrically opposed to the one inherent in Jesus’ life story. By his own gleeful admission, Trump is all about “winning, winning, winning.” This means that from the bedroom to the electoral college, he defines human value in terms of material and worldly success. Who’s got the hottest wife, the biggest fortune, the most votes? These are the questions that, for Trump, determine which members of our species are worthwhile. The losers–prisoners of war, victims of violence, the disabled–don’t count.
By contrast, perhaps the single most anomalous aspect of Christianity is that it united a global movement behind the biggest loser in history.
Read the whole thing here.
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