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The storm inside the last 24 hours has been raging too much to think straight, much less find words. I'm grateful for those that can--I don't claim to feel more deeply than anyone else. Just an acknowledgment of my limitations: I haven't felt coherent, much less constructive.
Disclaimer: I have strong feelings about guns in America. In my bumbling way, I'm attempting to follow the Christ who once & for all told Peter "put away your sword." The contrast between the way of the sword/the way of the gun is stark, & you cannot serve two masters.
So for the record: no, I can't comprehend a nation that has more guns than people, nor how no terror inflicted vile enough for their to be full consensus about even basic gun reform; & for that matter, I consider the @NRA a terrorist, antichrist organization, full-stop.
@NRA I DO believe that changing our laws can actually save lives, as it has elsewhere in the world, over & over; & that the refusal to even consider doing so is symptomatic of an idolatry so overt, craven & so conspicuous, I wonder if the OT prophets could even conceive of such.
@NRA AND YET, as much as I believe this & believe we must act now, the fire in my belly is mostly at this: in broad daylight, from the highest office in the land, the rhetoric of white supremacy has been state-sanctioned & injected into the main artery of our culture, with immunity.
@NRA I read the "manifesto." That manifesto is shared on the internet & in casual conversations all around us all day every day: "invaders...replacing us." It's NORMALIZED. We Pentecostals/Charismatics got plenty wrong, but we always understood this: words matter. Words have power.
@NRA White supremacy is not just an ideology; it is a principality. As such it cannot be cast out until it is named. I support the legislation...& I'm also here for the exorcism. Ask us what our name is, & we could not tell you. "My name is legion...FOR WE ARE MANY!" (via Mark 5)
@NRA My friend @postmodernegro powerfully imagined this spirit in our context (like the demoniac in Mark 5) saying "My name is... Amerikkka." Folks, nationalism, white supremacy, gun worship--are all interrelated spirits, conjured together in worship of that false god. All connected!
@NRA @postmodernegro In this regard I DO believe that this plague is spiritual, & that it must be cast out, not merely voted out. But let me tell you why I'm not on board with the we-just-need-to-pray-and-turn-back-to-Jesus/if-we-just-have-a-revival-God-will-work-it-out crowd:
@NRA @postmodernegro Because in America, TURNING TO JESUS has no content or meaning that is not privatized, spiritualized, pietized. To which Jesus will you turn? The one who says put down your sword & carry your cross (self-sacrificial love)? To what Jesus will you pray?
@NRA @postmodernegro Let's tell the truth: there's no one more dangerous in the world than the white American male--in our pettiness, fragility, entitlement, & at least nominally speaking? Our Christianity. Most white supremacists DO subscribe to at least some warped culturally Christian faith.
@NRA @postmodernegro People like me are literally everything that's wrong with the world. God's judgment on us has been SO clear, that we have an embodiment of our fragile collective ego in the White House that seems almost too caricatured to be REAL. But may no mistake, "bros"...HE is US.
@NRA @postmodernegro Jesus said He is "THE WAY, truth & the life." THE WAY. Say his name all you want, but if you don't understand what manner of way he is, or what his way entails, you take his name in vain. We need the WAY of Jesus. But the Jesus many worship is no Jesus at all, & will not save us!
@NRA @postmodernegro What a time we live in--when it seems people are more likely to be righteous & care about righteous things if they are outside the Church than in it. When faith not only fails to keep some of us from seeking justice--but actually is THE IDOL THAT KEEPS US FROM IT!
@NRA @postmodernegro God help us. No wonder Jesus said "You make them twice as much a child of hell as you are." People are truly better off to have no faith at all than to have the faith of Amerikkka. You seek to be full of that unholy spirit, drunk on outrage, & you only fill yourself with devils.
@NRA @postmodernegro It is exposed, revealed, plain. To choose to not see the demon of white supremacy now is surely what Jesus had in mind when he talked about the blasphemy of the Spirit: to see the truth, know the truth, not only willfully reject it but call it a lie? There is no other path for us
@NRA @postmodernegro No rhetorical flourishes, here. How we name these things, if we name these things, is a matter of ACTUAL life & death, not in some abstract spiritual way. I do not write any of this with glee. I am vexed & convicted. I will sit with this longer. But soon must get up, go harder.
@NRA @postmodernegro I know some of y'all are with me--having any final chains left of need for approval snipped off; ready to make a raw & primal shout, to grieve & scream & turn your lament into something fierce, holy & loving. Come on, kids. It's your time. Let that sound in you all the way out.
