Open Blogging
This interview with David Bentley Hart summarizes my own personal views.
Artman: “There is no question that this [administration] is a profoundly evil, authoritarian, and racist government that uses terrorism and extra-legal coercions at every possible level of society and every possible way to enforce power over a population.”
DBH: “What I would say to the Christians who are on the Trump bandwagon is that they are now, contrecoeur no doubt, accomplices of the spirit of antichrist in history and doing the work of Satan. That this is not a remotely plausible political decision [being MAGA] on the part of someone who claims to follow Christ. It is the embrace of basically a satanic view of human nature and of human polity.”
Artman: “I can understand why some of them might have been drawn to Trump because they were pro-life or because they thought LGBTQ and trans rights had gone too far. And maybe they felt like there needed to be a much more aggressive enforcement of our immigration policies and maybe they felt that America was losing its Christian identity and the Democrats were flawed and that they as conservatives, as Christians, were under attack by liberals and in the media. But in supporting Trump, they have aligned themselves with a law-breaking, violent, anti-democratic, fascist movement.”
DBH: “There is such a thing as invincible ignorance. Part of me, the angry part of me, wants to say, well, the only reason someone would support Trump is they are either very stupid, or very evil, or very psychotic, or all three things at once (I think that’s what we call the Rod Dreher trifecta). But at the end of the day, I realize that they’re very good people who are not so much stupid as just ignorant of the meaning of their actions and inattentive to what’s going on, no matter how spectacularly obvious it should seem to them.”
Artman: “Well, I may be overreacting a bit here, but I have low moments in which it seems to me that Christianity at this point is mostly just one big training ground for authoritarianism. Why should we still care about the norms and values and checks and balances and democratic systems of government? And what hope do we have of recovering it?”
DBH: “Yeah. Well, I mean, American Christianity isn’t Christianity, is it? I mean, there are Christians in America, but the distinctively American forms of Christianity are some completely different faith that just goes under that name.
Most white evangelicalism is a strange sort of orphic cult of personal salvation that has very little to do with the teachings of Christ and very little to do with Christian tradition. You know, when you see art online of Jesus looking surprisingly Scandinavian, carrying an American flag or even a semi-automatic weapon on the lawn of the White House, you realize that we might as well just be worshipping Moloch at this point and calling it Christianity. I mean, there’s nothing left of the gospel.”
It’s all yours, now…
I am sad at what I see occurring within the church-glorification of evil, deification of Trump, a push towards a “greatness” that is not great at all. And I don’t know what to do about it! I pray, I support my Hispanic brothers and sisters as much as I can , and the only response I have at church at the moment when issues come up is, “Yes, I am very concerned and no, I didn’t vote for him.” I don’t want to make any waves for the Hispanic congregation where I have staked my church identity. It’s very tense right now, and we have lost a number of our English-speaking congregants because of the senior pastor’s big support for Trump.
“Yeah. Well, I mean, American Christianity isn’t Christianity, is it?”
The problem is that much of Christianity in the rest of the world, emphatically including the recent immense global growth of Christianity in the last half century in the Global South, seems to me to be as unlovely as American Christianity: oppressive, rabidly anti-LGBTQ+, nationalistic, naively superstitious, embracing authoritarian-styles church leaders, cult-like. Am I wrong?
The podcast is sobering, to say the least…
Corrections often over correct. The MAGA movement, which is not a unified movement as one may observe over war in Iran, is a reaction to the nihilistic ideology of the Democratic Party.
Jean,
But they have over-corrected to the point of either total anarchy or ludicrous bombasticism. And, now we have a war with Iran that we have just entered…I hope all the little red buttons have been taped over!
Hi Linn,
I am against the US military involvement in Iran. I think it is a betrayal of the America first ethos of the MAGA movement.
Regarding anarchy, are you referring to the anti-ICE protests? I don’t live in California, so I only see what is reported on the news: burning police and other cars, spitting on law enforcement, blocking roads, smashing windows and looting? I’ve heard that the protests are mostly peaceful, but that there are agitators and opportunists that infiltrate these events to stir up trouble.
Jean,
Your boy Trump just vuolated that ethos to protect his fragile ego after his idiotic tough guy talk. Ragardless what the consequences are and what the Constitution says. We bombed Iran overnight. Once again the Cheeto Jesus takes his followers for suckers. He pisses on the face and they believe it is raining lemonade.
Any person who supports Trump deserves all the scorn and abuse for being played by the con artist. It was never America First for Trump. It has always been Trump First. And you are fools for thinking otherwise.
In my area of SoCal, I participated in an anti-ICE demonstration, the first of any kind of peaceful protest in my town. Not even back during Vietnam did they demonstrate, but this time they did, to express solidarity for Mexican migrants.
Greg J Anderson,
Thank you for standing with those I believe Jesus would stand with.
The anarchy I’ve seen over the last couple months has been created by unknown men and women in masks, without warrants or ID or uniform of any kind, kidnapping people off the streets with impunity and without accountability. They look and act like ISIS terrorists — how would that not create anarchy? how is that remotely compatible with Jesus Christ?
“The anarchy I’ve seen over the last couple months has been created by unknown men and women in masks, without warrants or ID or uniform of any kind, kidnapping people off the streets with impunity and without accountability. They look and act like ISIS terrorists — how would that not create anarchy? how is that remotely compatible with Jesus Christ?”
Whether I agree or disagree with this statement and emotion doesn’t matter.
Like all things there must be clarity and truth to make decisions. So here’s the truth about ICE Agents and arrest powers:
“ICE agents can use both administrative warrants and, in certain situations, rely on probable cause to make arrests without a warrant. Administrative warrants, unlike judicial warrants, are issued by immigration officials and don’t require a judge’s approval. However, they don’t grant the same authority as judicial warrants, particularly regarding entering private property. ICE can also arrest individuals without a warrant if there is probable cause to believe they are removable from the U.S. and there is a risk of them fleeing”
More in this article:
https://www.wbur.org/news/2025/05/22/ice-warrants-arrest-rules-massachusetts
“If ICE agents appear at your door, you have the right to ask questions and request to see their credentials and any warrants they may have. If they have a warrant, ensure it is a valid judicial warrant and not an administrative warrant, and understand that an administrative warrant does not authorize them to enter your home without consent. If they do not have a warrant, you can politely decline to answer questions or let them in. ”
Know your rights, the laws and don’t believe everything you’re being told by protest organizers or even the ICE Agents themselves.
Why should ICE agents, if that’s what they are, have the right to cover their faces? Do judges or government leaders have the right to cover their faces when interacting with the public? If an ICE agent, or someone purporting to be one, shows up at my door, or stops me on the street, do I have the right to ask them for ID, and are they obliged to show me their ID if I do ask? Must they read me my Miranda rights, and do I have the right to a free phone call and representation of a lawyer?
What difference does it make if I don’t believe the ICE agents, or those who identify as such, if they won’t answer my questions or heed my objections and insist on detaining me and whisking me off to another part of the country despite my protestations? How are they operating in a way different from secret police?
“Why should ICE agents, if that’s what they are, have the right to cover their faces?”
Why should peaceful protesters, if that is what they are?
Maybe ICE agents do it to protect their identity, for either their mission and/or to protect their families.
“how is that remotely compatible with Jesus Christ?”
It’s not…not in any way, shape, or form.
It’s a shame and blight on our nation.
Jean, And absence of announcing themselves and in possession of a valid judicial warrant, I and everybody else while exercise their 2A rights and proceed to ventilate their craniums if these masked gunman attempt to entire my private residence. That pesky thing known castle doctrine and stand your ground. Of course, the right firearm round will penetrate that pesky body armor. Interestingly Indiana has a law on the books if some dumbshit LEO gets killed executing an incorrect warrant (like to the wrong house) by homeowner exercising his castle doctrine rights, it is considered valid self-defense.
Jean,
I have 50 years of my life invested with immigrants as a missionary, teacher, and friend. I have never seen anything like what is occurring now (mentioned in previous emails). And they’re not getting many criminals- they are taking away people with green cards, high school students, people who have been making their immigration appointments for years…it’s cruel and heartless.
Some dumbshit JBT ICE hothead will cross the line and eff up big time. Maybe against the wrong person or friend relative of the wrong person. And will result in a few ICE agents in bodybags.
Their own numbers show that 90% of those arrested have never had an encounter with law enforcement.
Jean doesn’t care about the facts. ICE has a quota set by the Cheeto Jesus himself. Doesn’t matter if due process is ignored, Doesn’t matter if they going after people in courthouses trying to follow the rules. It is much easier for all these chickenshits ike Trump, his minions, and his supporters to get those people than to after the actual criminal aliens.
As long as we’re discussing this, I want to make one thing very clear.
I keep hearing that this election was a response to the moral degeneracy of the political left.
Theologically speaking…there is nothing short of murder more morally degenerate than how America is treating migrants, immigrants and people of color.
R’as al Ghul,
Clean up the language.
I understand the passion and probably think even more profanely than you on this issue, but let’s try to keep a standard of decency here.
Many or perhaps most of the people they are detaining are being taken because they failed to file the right form with immigration, or they filled out a form incorrectly, or they inadvertently didn’t meet some other bureaucratic requirement, not because they are felons or violent criminals. Some are being taken in immigration offices doing what they’re required to do, not knowing that their immigration status has been revoked for bureaucratic reasons because they haven’t received the notification yet.
I doubt my father who came to this country from Italy in the 1930s had proper paperwork; for God’s sake he could barely read or write Italian, never mind English! He was a peasant from a dirt poor part of Italy where the closest thing to a birth certificate you received was your baptismal certificate! Does that mean my citizenship may be put in question?
This America First/Trumpian movement is completely absurd, the concept of evil clowns elected by a populace out of touch with just how dangerous clowns can be. They are about to find out.
If mass deportation cannot be done humanely, then it shouldn’t be done. As far as I’m concerned that’s the long and short of it. And everything I’ve seen indicates that it cannot be done humanely, so it should not be done. Even if the existence of the country were at stake (it’s not) I would say the same.
“For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?” The same holds true for countries.
Robert, just like those F1 students who got their visas cancelled by Rubio who were never informed. The only found out when their schools happened to a check in the SEVIS system. If the bloody DMV can send a notice that your license will be suspended, you think Trump’s band of flying monkeys can do the same with visas.
Ra’s al Ghul,
The cruelty is not a bug, it’s a feature. Trump, Rubio, Noem, Bondi et al. want to play this all out in front of a MAGA electorate that they know is hungry for red meat, that thrills at the spectacle of immigrants being treated cruelly. That’s why this is only going to get worse, barring some radical and completely unforeseen circumstance.
It was good to hear D.B. Hart speak about this situation with such
biting clarity, but I think his pessimism about the fate of our country is completely warranted. Things only get worse from here, for everyone. There will be little good feeling to be had.
And they are without question going to use war against Iran as a rationale for further undermining civil and human rights not only of migrants, but American citizens too.
Their (MAGA) goal is classical fascism.
They don’t want a democracy.
They want a dictatorship.
It happened to both the German people and the Italian people in the 1930(s).
Greg,
When MAGA cultists and Christian Nationalists chant “Blood and Soil”, Trump says that immigrants are “poisoning the blood of this country” (something a former German corporal said), it is pretty obvious. Trump’s supporters might as well as create a new Bund party and wear brown uniforms while they are at it. Maybe we can have a deMAGAfication much like Germany did after WWII.
The people that are drinking the koolaid are criticizing the people that are eating the cats and dogs??
Jean (assuming you have the stones to respond),
Here is the reason ICE should not wear masks, be required to wear body cams, and be required to identify themselves with a credentials ID (not a badge). There have been numerous reports of fake ICE agents using the current ICE enforcement actions to commit crimes and terrorize people. You can buy fake badges, ICE jackets, and all kinds of police gear on Amazon. Since they have the authority of the state to back them and the authority of the state to use force, they MUST be held to a higher standard.
If some whiny-ass ICE agents (and their idiot leaders in Washington) complain about being doxxed or ID’ed, then maybe should not be Law Enforcement. Tough excrement. Besides other laws cover stalking, harassment, etc. I imagine most of the recent ICE hires are nothing more than pardoned Jan 6th thugs, 3-percenters, and Proud Boy bullies. Just like their damn Orange Dear Leader. And like most bullies and these wannabee bad-asses, they will run and scream like little girls once The Excrement Gets Real.