There’s a passage of Scripture that has been weighing on me. It is James 4:17: “Anyone who knows the right thing to do and fails to do it commits sin.” It’s been bothering me because I don’t like to write about contemporary politics. I like to write about the Bible, Christian theology, and the church. For years I have been enchanted by the idea of the “Christian colony,” popularized by Hauerwas and WIllimon. The church is a moral community that should witness to the world by living out its ideals, but the idea that we will somehow be a “transformer of culture,” as H. Richard Niebuhr suggested, was simply so much wishful thinking. As of late that idea has in some ways broken down for me. I still believe that the church should be a strongly moral community that witnesses to the non-Christian world by its way of living. But more and more I have come to believe that there are ethical truths that Christians need to speak into non-Christian contexts for the work of peace, justice, and righteousness.
For almost eleven years I have worked at United Theological Seminary. We have a fairly large Doctor of Ministry program that has long served primarily African-American churches. To be a part of this program, to listen to the amazing sermons of the students and mentors in our program, to engage the great tradition of social witness through preaching that has long characterized the African-American pulpit, has been an education for me. It is not my tradition, but it has shaped me in particular ways. Last year we ran a Doctor of Ministry intensive around the theme of racial justice and reconciliation. One could not sit through the sermons and plenaries without being moved by the lament, the heartbreak, the anger–and the belief that things really could be better, and perhaps someday they will be.
Presently, however, things are not getting better. In fact, with regard to issues of race in the United States, they seem to be getting worse. One could cite several concrete examples to demonstrate this, but I want to focus on the rise of the movement known as the “Alt-Right.” The newfound visibility of this movement shows that we are at a very important moment in our country, a kind of kairos moment that will be studied in eras to come. It is a defining moment for this nation and the church in North America.
What is the “Alt-Right”? According to The Economist,
The name sounds like a keyboard shortcut, which is appropriate because the Alt-Right is largely an online phenomenon. Its more cerebral fellow-travellers reheat criticisms of democracy that have been around since Plato. They argue that government of and by the people is flawed, and would prefer something more like the enlightened absolutism of Prussia under Frederick the Great. These people are not the ones to worry about. The bits of the Alt-Right that matter right now are those who say that members of different races should be kept apart, who aim abuse at Jewish Americans and think that calling a podcast “The Daily Shoah” is striking a bold blow for freedom of speech and against political correctness. To the extent that the Alt-Right dabbles in economics it is highly protectionist. It sees misogyny as a bold rebellion against the prevailing culture.
“Pepe the Frog” is the unofficial mascot of the Alt-Right
There are strong racist currents within the Alt-Right movement. According to no less of a conservative standard than the National Review,
Most on the Alt-Right do not only reject the “conservative Establishment” or some other contemporary bogeyman; they also reject the ideals of classical liberalism as such. That rejection grounds the thinking of Jared Taylor, and Richard Spencer, for instance — representative “intellectuals” of the Alt-Right, according to Bokhari and Yiannopoulos. These men — the founders of the publications American Renaissance and Radix Journal, respectively — have not simply been “accused of racism.” They are racist, by definition. Taylor’s “race realism,” for example, co-opts evolutionary biology in the hopes of demonstrating that the races have become sufficiently differentiated over the millennia to the point that the races are fundamentally — that is, biologically — different. Spencer, who promotes “White identity” and “White racial consciousness,” is beholden to similar “scientific” findings.
This movement was essentially underground until there emerged a viable political candidate around whom its adherents could rally. Now it has come into the mainstream. This is both bad and good. It is bad because this movement has power it never had before. Our current election has given it a modicum of legitimacy. It is good because this movement has long been lurking beneath the surface and we can now face it in the light of day.
One would expect liberals, Democrats, and progressives of all sorts to oppose this movement. The most important criticism, however, will need to come from conservatives. The Alt-Right movement has hitched itself to the conservative political wagon. Bear in mind that this movement does not express traditionally conservative values. As this article in the Daily Wire points out, the Alt-Right movement occupies some of the same political space as traditional conservatism, but it expresses very different values. Traditional conservatives who are willing to align with the Alt-Right in hopes of accomplishing particular aims are developing a very dangerous alliance, one that compromises some of their most important principles.
And that brings us to Donald Trump. The Alt-Right’s support of Trump is troubling, to say the least. That there is a coalescence of ideologies sufficient to garner unprecedented Alt-Right support of a mainstream candidate shows us that we are in a new day in American politics. You can read articles discussing the connections between Trump and the Alt-Right in publications such as The Atlantic, the New York Times, the National Review, the New Yorker, and U.S. News and World Report. I myself have expressed before my deep opposition to Trump. In fact, I have expressed reservations about both candidates, though Trump’s particular shortcomings put him a class by himself.
Many people will vote for Trump simply because they believe he will appoint conservative Supreme Court justices. They are concerned particularly about abortion, and that concern is determining their vote. I share this concern. There is a deep inconsistency, however, in choosing a candidate based on his stance regarding the lives of the unborn when he shows so little regard for the lives of people who have already been born. If you wish to protect the lives of the unborn, but you devalue the lives of Syrian refugees, Mexican immigrants, or victims of racial violence, you are not really pro-life. You are simply anti-abortion. If you wish to protect the lives of the unborn, but you feel free to degrade publicly women and people with disabilities, whatever your position is based on, it is not based on the dignity and sanctity of human life.
Others have made this argument before me. Sister Joan Chittister made similar claims some time back. She was subsequently lauded by liberals and lambasted by conservatives. It was clear that many people misunderstood her statement, which was less about the ethics of abortion than it was about the need to care for people both before and after birth. I am certainly no expert on Roman Catholic ethical teaching, but an ethic that values life both before and after birth is consistent with the encyclical of John Paul II, Evangelium Vitae, which states,
In our service of charity, we must be inspired and distinguished by a specific attitude: we must care for the other as a person for whom God has made us responsible. As disciples of Jesus, we are called to become neighbours to everyone (cf. Lk 10:29-37), and to show special favour to those who are poorest, most alone and most in need. In helping the hungry, the thirsty, the foreigner, the naked, the sick, the imprisoned–as well as the child in the womb and the old person who is suffering or near death–we have the opportunity to serve Jesus. He himself said: “As you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me” (Mt 25:40). Hence we cannot but feel called to account and judged by the ever relevant words of Saint John Chrysostom: “Do you wish to honour the body of Christ? Do not neglect it when you find it naked. Do not do it homage here in the church with silk fabrics only to neglect it outside where it suffers cold and nakedness” (87).
Hello. I am at an interesting point in my theology. I find myself slowly drifting to the Anabaptist position of non-intervention. Maybe it’s the fact that both candidates are so morally offensive that I feel like a vote for either of them would be a direct betrayal of my God. The fact that you spent so much time talking about this in a post, against your own conscience it seems, illustrates the need to me for Christians to further pull ourselves from the politics of this world. After all, no leader is ever put into place except that God place them there for His purposes, in this way it almost seems futile to vote at all. That being said, if I am to vote I must do as my conscious dictates rather then what mainstream media tells me are my only options. If I vote it will likely be for a third party, possibly Castle of the Constitution Party. I think Martin Luther sums it up the best “Do go against conscious is neither right nor safe, here I stand I can do no other, so help me God. Amen.” Imagine what the election season would look like if people actually voted their conscious. Any way, thank you for the article.
I am voting my conscience and voting for Evan McMullin. He came late to the race, so he is a write-in in many states, but he has the dignity and experience I feel is needed. He also has a platform I can get behind. Check him out: https://evanmcmull.in/2dyPMDH
While I find this article entertaining, I find it so full of hypocritical holes I have to look where I am walking.. I see no discussion of those on the left, communist, socialist, the gay lobby, LBGT radicals, transgendered advocates who are advocating the destruction of religious belief in America or bastardizing it to the point that it has nothing to do with the scriptures and they re all DEMOCRATS. Where have you and the ministers been on this. While I don’t support the “alt-right” I for one who is and has been politically active for over 25 years have never heard of them until the Clinton campaign conjured them up. The democrat Party and the left have been those who have worked tirelessly to divide this country along racial lines, especially during election time. What I read here is just another propagandist for the Democrat Party, seeking to divide and enrage. This is why I do not hold those in positions in our Theological Schools in any high esteem. I find them to be nothing more than Faux Christians, never having a personal experience with Jesus the Christ.
This election is filled with inhibitions and smoke screens.
Ever candidate has some form of two faced-ness to their agenda. I would like to vote for Johnson on the basis that everyone will be free to do whatever they want, however they want to do it. This, however, does not promote freedom, but anarchy. There are many in our Christian circles who would like to feel as if we can do whatever we want, however we want to do it. Such is not the case. And, while the premise sounds good the outcome will be complete and utter unrighteousness. Worse than we have seen in any previous presidency. Trump & Clinton exacerbate the worst of the right and left agendas while Johnson brings all others to the court and gets them involved.
No good candidates this round.
We vote and we trust in the Lord to guide us.
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