If you’re a Trump supporter and you think you’re going to challenge me to a “Biblical debate” save it. If you’d truly read the Bible you’d recognize the golden idol you’re bowing down to. And if you really cared about the teachings of Jesus you wouldn’t be a Trump supporter.
Nothing tells me you’ve lost the plot more than being anti-mask, anti-vaxx, anti-immigrant, anti-empathy, and pro-gun—while claiming you follow a Jesus who healed the sick, fed the hungry, welcomed the stranger, and shunned retributive violence. Hit the books again.
I have news for you: Donald Trump is the antithesis of Jesus and MAGA is exactly the kind of hateful, nationalistic, predatory, violent movement Jesus spent his life warning good people to reject. If you have a problem with that, take it up with God.
I wrote this book because I spent 25 years as a local church pastor, I’ve read, studied, and preached the Bible—and I know that if your faith doesn’t make you more empathetic, usher in justice, welcome diversity, and love the least, it’s a waste of time.
These are my convictions and I don’t require that you agree with them to validate them. I know my road and I know what I’ve seen and experienced. I’m way beyond needing anyone’s approval and I have great joy in the truth that compassion is the better path and I rest in that.
It’s OK if you hate me, because I know you are addled by a faith of fear that requires enemies, adversaries, and threats to survive—which is why you build walls, hoard resources, shun difference, and despise outsiders. I know better. I know it’s Love for the win. Amen.
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Back in 1989, I snuck into the Philadelphia Spectrum disguised as a roadie. I hadn't intended to, but just impulsively walked down the load-in ramp, and since I looked the part, no one stopped me. I was actually shocked. It was 2:00PM.
I spent the afternoon in the bowels of the venue, walking back and forth with a large roll of brown craft paper and trying to look busy. I ducked into the band's dressing room for a bit, looked at their guitars, and watched the stage being assembled.
As the afternoon wore on, the people in the hallways began to clear out, and it was getting more and more difficult to blend in. I found myself about six inches from Jon and the band as they arrived for soundcheck, but had to pretend my heart wasn't about to explode.
The Good Samaritan tended to a wound and helped a victim of violence, he didn’t use violence. You can’t strangle someone by accident.
And if you’re here trying to justify this for any reason, move along—especially if you claim to be a follower of Jesus. You’ve missed the entire point of your faith.
Last week I was coming out of the drugstore and in a hurry. I opened my car door, only to see a woman I didn't know in the passenger seat. It was then I realized I had opened the wrong car door.
I apologized immediately and profusely to the woman and pointed to the exact same make and model car next to her as I scurried away, mortified. She smiled through the window, laughing off the awkward moment and waving.
I later realized how grateful I was that the woman in that car was not one of the gun-clutching, fear-addled Americans manipulated by Conservative politics and media into being perpetually terrified. I know my family is grateful too. I made it home, embarrassed but alive
"The Club Q (the site of the murders) had planned to host a 'Friendsgiving' dinner this Thursday for all the folks who don’t have family that love them. If they go ahead, the one way we can help them is by donating food."
This not only shows the beautiful heart of the LGBTQ community, but it is a further reminder of the cancer of hatred: the way it permeates from politics and pulpits and into families and homes.
As Thanksgiving approaches, please consider supporting LGBTQ-friendly organizations in your community, opening your home to people without loving families, and speaking up in the face of phobia in your circles of influence.
No one on the Left is surprised by the assassination attempt on Nancy Pelosi and the brutal assault on her husband. This is what the Republicans under Trump are and will be. It is the rotten, putrid fruit of MAGA. It is the only logical evolution of Trumpism.
I could tell you countless stories about the documented cases of harassment, threats, and violence I and other progressive ministers writers, speakers, and politicians have received since 2016, all at the hands of professed "Christian patriots."
Republicans have no vision, no ideas, nothing redemptive to offer this nation, no decent or noble impulses. Their sole objective is inciting fear in their base by the demonizing of opposition through every kind of gross distortion and abject lie.
"If you keep attacking gun owners, you'll never change hearts!"
Nonsense.
It they had hearts capable of changing, any of these would have altered them:
Thurston High School.
Columbine High School.
Heritage High School.
Deming Middle School.
Fort Gibson Middle School.
Buell Elementary School.
Lake Worth Middle School.
University of Arkansas.
Junipero Serra High School.
Santana High School.
Bishop Neumann High School.
Pacific Lutheran University.
Granite Hills High School.
Lew Wallace High School.
Martin Luther King, Jr. High School.
Appalachian School of Law.
Washington High School.
Conception Abbey.
Benjamin Tasker Middle School.
University of Arizona.
Lincoln High School.
John McDonogh High School.
Red Lion Area Junior High School.
Case Western Reserve University.
Rocori High School.