With Monday’s inauguration, we have entered a new phase of the testing of our faith.
I’m supposed to be a regular BNG columnist, but I’ve only written one piece since the election — one about our need to resist what is to come under Trump 2.0.
Since then, I’ve fallen into such a state of despair, I have felt there’s no point in writing. It’s spitting into the wind.
I’ve completely lost faith in the institutional church. The evangelical church betrayed everything it once claimed to believe in and chose Trumpism over Christianity. The progressive church has simply been ineffective.
Susan Shaw
Media outlets, corporations, politicians, bureaucrats and even many universities have been quick to bow the knee and kiss the ring to ensure wealth flows their way, no matter the cost to integrity or human life.
It feels hopeless.
I find myself wanting to give in to the rage I feel, to wish a plague on Trump and his supporters, to stop caring and just hide out to weather the storm in my own little circle of loved ones.
Today, I realized this is the real test of faith.
Can we keep love intact, even as we resist injustice, hatred and violence?
If we want to claim Christian faith, we must not give up on those core values of our faith — love, justice, acceptance, peace, truth, mercy — no matter what goes on around us. Trump and his ilk test those values for me. I do not want to love him. I want to call down hellfire on his head. I want old-fashioned retribution for his followers when his policies harm them and he fails them. I want to be as ugly as they are.
But I don’t really. I don’t. And I have to remind myself of that. My Christian faith tells me I must love even those I oppose. That I must love those who hate me for who I am. That I must work for good for all people, even those who would send me back into the closet, write trans people out of existence, deport immigrants and deny refugees.
I wonder if I can do it.
If my faith is real, I must. That’s a tall order.
If I respond in kind to MAGA bigotry, hatred, exclusion and violence, then I am no different from them, and I am certainly no follower of Jesus.
I see now on social media that many white Christian nationalists are completely rejecting the Sermon on the Mount, saying it’s weak.
“We must resist this fascist white Christian nationalist regime at every turn, but we must do it in love.”
I disagree. I think the strength it takes to live its precepts is almost superhuman. Love is so much harder than hate. Giving in to the rage would be so easy right now. Loving, not so much.
We must resist this fascist white Christian nationalist regime at every turn, but we must do it in love. That is our present test of faith. Can we continue to believe in and practice a love so big, so inclusive, so divine that we can resist evil without hating our fellow human beings?
Having this as a goal is helping to focus me so I can move past the rage and fear and work on letting go of the ill will I feel. I think this is the only way I will survive the next four years with my inner self and my faith intact. I have to find my peace in love.
Love is a choice, and it will be what sets faithful believers apart from those who profess Christian faith but do not practice it. If there is any hope for the progressive church to provide an effective witness, it must be in the way we love, no matter the circumstances.
Susan M. Shaw is professor of women, gender and sexuality studies at Oregon State University in Corvallis, Ore. She also is an ordained Baptist minister and holds master’s and doctoral degrees from Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. Her most recent book is Intersectional Theology: An Introductory Guide, co-authored with Grace Ji-Sun Kim.
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