“Dang! I’ve not only been persecuted, I’m gettin’ litigated!”
– Jesus Christ sometime in the near future.
I am a Christian by faith, born as one, baptized as one, a decent of Christianity but I am not a practicing Christian. I know right from wrong. My relationship with God is broken, and my following of Christ is complicated. Ironically, many typical minded Americans who claim to be a “Christian” seem to left their Bibles in some dusty surface, because so many don’t come off as such.
The focus here is on the protestant/Baptist wing of Christianity; since Catholicism, is known to be a centralized, global institution of the Christian faith. The concern is in the last decade, the protestant wing has in a way become centralized; and while thousands and thousands of Baptist churches are not connected as an organization, the messaging itself is kinda blurring the lines between Protestants and Catholics. Either way, it’s turning off American’s core demographic, Pew research notes have indicated steep drops of Americans attending church comparing data from the last 2 decades.
The bottom line is, that The Church will have declare a moral bankruptcy in the Federal court system, and this unique case will probably go to SCOTUS, testing out something I suspect the founding fathers would never had foreseen, the failed nationalization of “The Church”; and testing the First Amendment on the freedom of religion aspect of that bylaw.
The Church’s Hyper Political Focus
When I was a teenager in the early 00s, the biggest thing that made Christianity all freaking out was on gay marriages, because at that point, general acceptance of LGBTQ was still selective outside the coastal cities. Anti-abortion was branded as “Pro Choice”; and the biggest threat to man was the end of the world and anyone in the Democratic party trying to take over the country into Socialism and/or communism.
Politics amongst fellow Christians stayed within the cluster; but you never heard a reverend ever utter political rants or raves. While I did go to a Baptist church in Chester for a year or so; I didn’t feel comfortable for a number of reasons, that can’t fit in this post because the scope has to remain a big picture.
The “True Christian” Gambit
One of the playbooks of The Church is who can decide a “True Christian” vs. one who isn’t. This is a big turnoff to anyone whose agnostic who may have a higher tolerance than an older Protestant. This in short is almost akin to the theological demagoguery that was seen in New Hampshire state politics as far back as the early 2000s, and domestically in the 2016 Presidential Election. This possibly can turn people away from The Church or The Church is indiscriminately discriminating decent-people who may not believe the entire Bible. Just because a person doesn’t check every-box doesn’t make them sinful. Since afterall Christianity prohibits prejudice, right?
The 2016 Sell Out of The Church
In 2016, the projected Republican Presidential Candidate, Donald J. Trump, the head of The Trump Organization and The Church seemed to be a strange arraigned marriage from a man who was not even close to holier than thou. The same Trump who declared his company bankrupt in a handful of times in less than 2 decades. The same Trump who stole other peoples money to pay off reckless debt (thou shall not steal.) The man who was on his third marriage to Melania (thou shall not commit adultery.) A man who shouts “God Bless America” that likely makes it appear that he’s God himself (no other gods before me). A man who disposed his mother, but admired his killer-instinct father (Honor thy father and thy mother). A typical crass New Yorker who probably never went to any “town” in the Tristate area under a population of 100,000; but for some unknown reason understood what “middle America” was missing.
For some unknown reason Christians went either smitten politically with Ted Cruz (who could the sake of argument did not pass the “True Christian” filter); and others went with Donald Trump, like he was part of some boy-band where women went crazy on him and fat dudes just admired an empty man.
By the time Trump became the nominee, a vast majority either held their nose, or just believed in Trump’s rhetoric and put their checkbooks over decency. In reality, The Church had basically sold themselves out in a leverage buyout (or an LBO) to the top bidder, that could very well be Satan himself. The problem is will some valuable and moral equity be returned to The Church since Donald Trump has been fired from the Oval Office? Given The Trump Organizations pending lawsuits from the Southern District and Albany; should The Church also be notified (of thou shall not bear false witness against thy neighbor) since Trump would likely be testified under oath?
The Coronavirus “Plandemic”
Howie Carr, once from WRKO Boston once said in the late 00s “if you don’t believe in something you’ll believe in anything” in regards to the “Church of Global Warming” and Al Gore’s climate change agenda. Ironically it was only just about 5 years before those words Howie probably forgot did this phrase became so moldy. Many modern-day self-described “Christians” do not believe in science, so it wasn’t an inherit surprise after the initial shutdown in spring of 2020, did skeptics come out of the woodwork. Some had felt victimized they were unable to practice freedom of religion, at a time where churches were not readably available to handle social distancing, and personal protective equipment, since there was a super-spreader event that occurred in a church across the other side of the world before it made it’s way west and further west.
Some left of center people who may had been skeptical of the pandemic, the party of personal responsibility and individualism that often are considered to be Christians were the ones with the most vocal opponents of attempting to “flatten the curve”, the same faithful people who claim to be pro-life. President Trump was apparently pro-choice, by neglecting responsibility for the hundreds of thousands of deaths from COVID19 that trumped the annual motor vehicle accidents (nearly 30,000 in CY 2018), or even the standard flu (67,000 in the 2018 flu season.) Within the first month, the numbers the self-righteous right of center “Christians” would argue would become a moot point as those numbers combined would quadruple by the end of the year.
The most important issue amongst the right was the economy.
Skepticism, and hyper cynicism became a bigger and bigger issue as the spring of 2020 would go along, as many started to believe in conspiracy theories as if it was fact, one was a documentary called Plandemic that was based on very loose information that wasn’t really confirmed for sources and facts. At the same time, two California ER docs wrote off COVID19 to the point, where their press conference, they didn’t even socially distance.
While that part may not be Christianity per se, the question should ask, at what point did Christianity in it’s truest sense end, and Christianity by name only begin? The anti vax movement dates as far back from the Measles outbreak in Minn. in early 2015; but would become more mainstream, and acerbated by a zillion-fold in the midst of the pandemic. States would allow exemptions based on “religious reasons” but remember with the separation of church and state, school districts couldn’t just ask a family why. Mixing in anti-vaxxers with the Trump Train, anyone who was a rational Christian (if there is any) really was pushed away, if rational Christians even existed prior to.
I know whose a Christian by name only. I know a few. They aren’t my friends. They lean hard right, very hard conservatives. Their political views are based on personal core beliefs; that are formed early in life, that is considered to be non-negotiable if a possibility of new lessons are brought to them. The views are not scientific, whether it’s political or the classical science; it’s what they believe, whatever a belief is when it comes to settled facts. The feedback loop is The Church, and many other people who are not reverends like the late Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin, Tucker Carlson, etc. are great at lecturing and preaching core beliefs, and those same principals cannot change at any time, even if it’s during a pandemic. The fear is that, a leftie, atheist will “take away your rights” and the only way to “fight for those rights” is to basically stay politically and theologically static during a crisis.
“I can’t Breathe” – Blue on Black Murder
On Memorial Day 2020, a Black man, was brutally interrogated, and was allegedly killed by a “chokehold” from a Minneapolis police officer. As the trial against the officer, Derek Chauvin took place at the time of this writing, this decent-American stereotype violated every Judeo-Christian values. Not only was he caught on his own body cam, but his partner’s body cam, a city surveillance camera, but the crime was also documented by a half dozen bystanders. These same groups of people who were considered to the cops as “distractions” claimed to be “rowdy” in reality, this group just over a dozen persons, basically just said a few bad words, and barely “yelling” or “shouting” compared how loud and deep their octaves were against George Floyd. This small number of hopeless bystanders complied with other officer’s orders, as they had witnessed the victim, George Floyd die with 3 officers basically sitting on him while he repeatedly said “I can’t breathe!” and within 4 minutes of this restraint Mr. Chauvin uttered “he passed out” despite being trained on how to resuscitate what became of an alleged suspect to a patient.
The Good Samaritan Law that became legal by all 50 states at least by the year 2000 seems to not apply to a man with a badge. Any of the bystanders were watching in hopelessness as the men in blue basically killed a man, didn’t render any aid, even trained, and who knows what will happen at the time of this writing . Blue on black crime is ticking up again, and typically, any brutality isn’t punished if it was a civilian. Let alone Caucasian. It seems like anyone who does bad, gets rewarded, which defeats a purpose like the Good Samaritan law is intended to be. So much for being “pro-life” huh?
In the apparent murder of George Floyd, and the trial of Chauvin; it seemed like people who were calling attention to the officers to render aid “a distraction” or even a “threat”, and apparently using some swear words was apparently offensive, but in the body cam one of the cops said Jesus’ name in full (thou shall not use name in vein)
It seems like a “bad apple” in the law enforcement world is apparently pro-life if the person matches his skintone. Ironically if it’s someone with a darker skin tone, it quickly becomes pro-choice. Humm, I didn’t realize that Christianity was pick-and-choose system.
The Unpopular Apocalypse
The Christian wackies had preached the world was coming to end about a decade plus ago. Earthquakes and seismic activities would occur in unusual spots; Yellowstone would rupture and take out most of the Mountain and Central Time Zones, maybe impact the East Coast too!
Did the Followers of Christ think the events on January 6th be considered to be a bit sinful? It seemed, 6 days into 2021 – the day of the infamous Insurrection, it appeared that Trump and Christianity was merged and people worshipped Donald J. Trump as the sole President of the United States; since they believed the states were out to persecute Trump personally.
These groups of people also brought a fake noose in an attempt to threaten the Vice President! People put their checkbook issues first over other important things that Jesus Christ would care more about. Many of Trump’s “followers” believe he should be the king to our country, despite destroying all of the institutions; befriending enemies; and supporting low hanging fruits like some of the Blue Lives Matter groups, and try to blame other groups for destruction of property after the George Floyd brutality; and threw the ANTIFA group under the bus causing the Insurrection; though in April 2021, there is no confirmation that ANTIFA was even remotely responsible.
Excuse me, but where the hell are the Christians to fully say this is not OK at all, full stop? Why are these supposed holy people making any justification?
The Collapsing of the Walls of Christ
I am not intending to be a visionary, but to call out something to be thinking about down the road. Imagine this: a pretty hippie gal, liberal as heck – but the biggest sweetheart in the world attends a church. She can look decent, but she starts to get uncomfortable of the agenda coming from the reverend. She stays silent because she’s an open minded person, while her peer Christians look down outside their scope of personal “core beliefs”. She wants to be a good neighbor and follow Christ. She lives in a rural area. She kinda gets pushed out because she wears a mask and want to keep her distance, among other things that goes against this very hard right church. What is she to do? Take it to court and look like she’s some special-snowflake leftist, when in reality, it’s the self-identified Christians who are easily triggered!
It goes to SCOTUS. What the hell are they supposed to do with this? The Church became The State, the hippie chickie can’t get First Amendment Protection. SCOUTS is confused, because the few “originalists” can’t relate to what the founding fathers saw with religious protection and how the separation of church and state didn’t see how extreme The Church took State values as the next populous President has been elected thanks to the support of The Church.
SCOTUS seems to realize that The Church started to sell out to become politically nationalized by President Trump after his 2016 election and his sequential 2020 loss which at the time the Courts view that was when The Church declares moral bankruptcy protection. Will the lovely, leftie, hippie chickie be able to practice her faith as a responsible citizen in her community even if her views she doesn’t share are not popular in the Protestant Church?
You think I am writing a novel, but what if this happens? Would you believe it? Would you take it seriously?
Christianity is falling apart from within. They’ll say the MSM, that pesky mainstream media that mocks anything that is Christian through films and TV shows and news reporters are the ones who mock such values. Maybe Christians need to look at themselves in the mirror and wonder whose mocking who. Their actions in the last few years have given Christianity as a whole a bad name. And they only have to blame themselves for throwing innocent people into their mess.
#