Political Memes

Our pastor, Dr. Jim Rigby, is on his writing leave, but I don't know how much writing is really getting done. I sent him a text asking for some inspiration for this sermon, and he sent me this:

It's "The top reasons beer is better than religion."

1. When you have beer, you don't knock on people's doors trying to give it away.
2. There are laws forcing beer on minors who can't think for themselves.
3. Nobody has ever been burned at the stake because of their favorite brand of beer.
4. You don't have to wait more than 2000 years for a second beer.
5. If you've devoted your life to beer, there are groups to help you.

My granddad was a Baptist preacher. I've been a member of this church since I was two years old and now I'm in seminary studying to become a minister myself. My faith means more to me than anything but, if I'm being very honest, sometimes I hesitate for telling someone I'm a Christian.

There is a cancer on our religion. Until we confess the sin that is Christian nationalism and exorcize it from our churches, our religion can do a lot more damage than a six-pack of Lone Star. There is nothing Christian about Christian nationalism. It is the worship of power - social power, economic power, political power - in the name of Christ, and it is a betrayal of Jesus of Nazareth.

He told us we would know them by their fruits. Jesus includes. Christian nationalism excludes. Jesus liberates. Christian nationalism controls. Jesus saves. Christian nationalism kills. Jesus started a universal movement based on mutual love. Christian nationalism is a sectarian movement based on mutual hate. Jesus came to transform the world. Christian nationalism is here to maintain the status quo. They have co-opted the Son of God. They've turned this humble Rabbi into a gun-toting, gay-bashing, science-denying, money-loving, fear-mongering fascist and it is incumbent upon all Christians to confront it and denounce it.

Christian nationalism is on the rise. Two years ago, Christian nationalists stormed the US capital killing police officers while carrying crosses and signs reading "Jesus saves." Last year, Christian nationalists on the US Supreme Court overturned Roe versus Wade, allowing States like ours to outlaw abortion even in cases of rape and incest. And as we speak, two Christian nationalist billionaires are trying to replace public schools in Texas with private Christian schooling. We are closer than we think to a Christian theocracy.

How did this happen? The first followers of Jesus didn't call themselves Christians. They called themselves "the way." Their crucified teacher taught them a different way of being human and they intended to follow it. The early church was a revolutionary community built on radical love - a peculiar people who shared all their possessions and refused to participate in the economy, the military, or the culture.

The book of Acts tells us that the first Christians were persecuted for turning the world upside down but, 300 years after Jesus was executed by the Roman Empire, Emperor Constantine made Christianity the official state religion of that very same Empire. Constantine was the first Christian Nationalist and ever since the powers-that-be have been taming Christianity, domesticating it, diluting it into something more palatable: pro-war, pro-wealth, pro-white supremacy. That original countercultural movement became a tranquilized, privatized, weaponized religion: the official sponsor of Western Civilization. A religion of sharing became a religion of greed. A religion of peace became a religion of violence. A religion of forgiveness became a religion of judgment. A religion of ego transformation became a religion of ego affirmation.

Today, Christian nationalists obsess over people's private parts while the planet burns. Eight men own as much wealth as 3.6 billion people and Christian nationalists are boycotting Barbie. The Bible doesn't mention abortion or gay marriage but it goes on and on about forgiving debt, liberating the poor and healing the sick. Christian nationalists like to say this is a Christian nation. Not only is that historically inaccurate, not only is that theologically blasphemous, but it's also just not true.

Look around us. If this was truly a Christian nation, we would forgive student debt. If this was truly a Christian nation, we would guarantee health care to every single person. If this was truly a Christian nation, we would love all of our LGBTQ neighbors. If this was truly a Christian nation, we would make sure every child in this state and in this country was housed, fed, clothed, educated, and insured. If this was truly a Christian nation, we would never make it a Christian nation because we know the table of Fellowship is open to everybody including our Buddhist, Hindu, Jewish, Muslim, Sihk and atheist neighbors. Jesus could have started a Christian theocracy, but love would never do that. The closest thing we have to the Kingdom of Heaven is a multi-racial multicultural democracy where power is truly shared among all people - something that's yet to exist in human history.

Christian nationalism is not only a threat to the American experiment in democracy, it's also a threat to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. When someone asked Jesus to name his most important commandment, he cheats and gives two - two that he says are related. The first is to love God. The second he said is like it: love thy neighbor as thyself. It's like it because, when I recognize the Divine image in myself, I can't help but recognize it in my neighbor whether they're Christian or not, whether they're religious or not. In the parable of the Good Samaritan, Jesus specifically defines neighbor as someone different from us: racially, economically, politically, religiously. God loves diversity. God loves variety. Just look around this big beautiful planet of ours. Do we really think think God would make all these beautiful people with all their beautiful traditions for no reason at all?

There are so many pathways to the sacred. The Islamic Mystic Rumi said, "every religion has love but love has no religion." God is so much bigger than our human categories. God is not a Presbyterian. God is not a Christian. God is not a noun at all. God is a verb. God is not a being. God is being itself. God is love and that's why Jesus is against anything that gets in the way of that love between neighbors, including religion. That's why he's always breaking religious rules. That's why he's always getting in trouble with the religious authorities. That's why he says "sinners will see the Kingdom of Heaven before religious people do." Sorry to everyone here. I know you came all this way.

Religious supremacy is antithetical to the Gospel of Jesus. Christ Jesus didn't come to establish a Christian Nation. He came to reveal ultimate reality, which he called the Kingdom of God, but it's not like any kingdom we've ever known. Instead of a throne, Jesus sits at a table. Instead of a warhorse, Jesus rides a donkey. Instead of a sword, Jesus picks up a cross. The Kingdom of God inverts the power dynamics of all the kingdoms in the world. True strength is vulnerability. True status is equality. True wealth is sharing, and we as Christians are called to realize that "Kingdom on Earth as it is in heaven" not by force but by faith.

Jesus asked us to have the faith of a mustard seed, trusting that by living and dying for love, we give birth to a better world. That's not easy to do. In a world full of fear, Jesus knew we would put our trust in something other than God - something other than love. As a Jewish rabbi, he called those things idols: money, status, and the most dangerous idol of all, power. When Jesus was tempted by the Devil in the wilderness, one of the things the Devil offered was power. All the kingdoms of the world and Jesus rejected it. When his disciples asked who will be the most powerful in the Kingdom of God, Jesus said "you know the lords of the Earth push their people around, but among you it'll be different. Whoever wants to be a leader among you must be a servant."

And when they still didn't get it and they asked who will be the greatest in the Kingdom of God, Jesus said little children - the least powerful but most trusting members of any human community. That's the Kingdom of God.

I think Chance the Rapper said it best: "Don't believe in kings, believe in the kingdom." Jesus knew. In the words of Dorothy Soelle, there is only one legitimation of power and that is to share it with others. Power that is not shared, power that is not transformed into love is pure domination and oppression. Christian nationalists are more committed to the love of power than to the power of love, and it exposes a lack of faith because the opposite of faith is not doubt. Doubt is a healthy part of any faith. The opposite of faith is control. When we stop trusting God, when we stop trusting love, we start taking control ourselves.

Christian nationalists want to control what we read, who we marry, where we travel, when we have children. They want to control our minds and our bodies. "Oh, ye of little faith." Christian nationalists trust domination because they think domination is what works, but Jesus revealed that the true power of the universe is not domination, but love.