In terms of expressing religious faith, I think of politics being the last best use of my favorite description of WASP etiquette: “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” I see no upside in commingling the most exquisitely profane human endeavor, politics, into universal faithful messages of morality and grace. So when the word “Evil” is invoked for a politician (or whatever President Trump is) I cringe.
For me, faith is completely wrecked in politics — on every level. I am queasy over “In God We Trust.” I think of the “religious right” or “liberation theology” as great enabling buzzkills to convert the agnostic straight to atheism. Political discord is healthy. Biblically allusive self-righteousness is toxic.
In that mindset I’ve previously posited that despite his extreme weirdness, President Trump does not rise to the level of Evil… Not a comfy place to be. I was spanked pretty corporeally for “normalization” of a Demi-Satan:
A very smart, creative architect launched in response: “He is evil. Those who watched him in New York know that he is evil. His closest advisors are on record as saying they want to destroy American…he’s moving swiftly to consolidate a sweeping plan in the next 90 days that will be all but impossible to reverse.”
Apocalypse Now.
This reactionary blurt has deep roots: all politics is local. It’s so local that it gets personal: especially in a minority-vote president — who has orange skin — and uses TV-deep logic and syntax — and is, well, vulgar and tone deaf. But it’s not just his obvious weirdnesses — our entire culture is careening to instantly escalate criticism to “11” — DEFCON 5 — at the drop of an objectionable turn of phrase. It has nothing to do with ideology or party: more voters thought Hillary was more Evil than Trump in the last election.
But there is a larger reality implied. Can Christians loathe the sin and love the sinner when the sinner is “Evil”? The atheist argument is that there is no logic in Hitler going to heaven on the basis of a death bed “Oops.” Yup. I believe in God, but it beats the hell out of me, literally, to understand what, and even if, there are mechanisms and rules of grace. But then again, I did not go to seminary…
All humans: atheist, spiritual, agnostic, saved-in-the-blood-of-Jesus know — really know — that evil exists. I think that is because we see glimmers of it in ourselves. I think we convert ideas into moral judgment because we want surety in the presumption that we are not evil. We want to be right because we want to be good. And the barometers of right and wrong are detaching from religion at light speed.
So absent going to church, humans are glomming on cultural exemplars as their New New Testament of Good and Evil: a range of “-ism”s are incontrovertibly Evil: they are us at our worst. And despite all commitments to the Good, the honest know that those nasty realities of self-imbued cruelty lurk in all of us. On Avenue Q, “Everybody is just a little bit racist.” So it’s an easy segue when politics appropriates the moral outrage against cruelty into political advantage of righteous hatred of humans who project cruelty.
As does, naturally, our literature. There could be no Force without a Dark Side. Whether Iago or Voldemort, writers make readers recoil to wrap them into their plot line. This Internet Century has made pop culture high art, and there is no higher pop art than JK Rowling’s description of Harry Potter’s youth. Those books are supplanting traditional allegory to connect an entire sub-40-year-old generation to universal constructs. A while ago I spied a bumper sticker that said, “Bush & Voldemort in 2004.” Recently the National Review equated Senator Patty Murray to Delores Umbridge. It’s not just politics, either — I have equated the two new Yale Colleges to Hogwarts.
So here, I ask you, would you pray for Voldemort?
Severus Snape was a mean, brutal bully — just about evil. But redeemed in the end by the plot line. But that rang true because things like forgiveness and grace are as real as the fear of evil. Pope John Paul II forgave his would-be assassin. The families of those killed at Bible Study forgave Dylann Roof.
I cannot see how those who have painted themselves into the corner of unlimited loathing for Leader Trump could ever allow his humanity to overcome their fear of his evilness. I can see a window to his non-evilness, not because of some sense of superior moral perception — quite the opposite.
I can be Trumpian — in spades. I know the hatred I felt as an athlete: it was scary, but empowering and useful. I want every job any other architect ever gets. I want disappointment to happen to those I perceive as arrogant, or just anyone who pisses me off. I can pray for Trump — and if he existed, Voldemort — because, well, I fail at kindness, compassion, and judgment every day. I am just like Trump: a human.
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27 responses to “Pray for Voldemort?”
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I think this is VERY, VERY good!
me too
Just when I thought that I couldn’t love you more…
This is excellent.
i like this…i don’t think Trump is evil at all….for some of the same reasons….Read “the great Sin” from Mere Christianity …..i look at the discription of “misunderstanding #1 as the type of pride DT has….almost an innocent pride that most of us would hide, but he is right out there….I may be wrong but he doesn’t seem to be hiding anything about himself to me……but that’s. just me….i’m happy he won. Sue J
People are finding deep meaning in essential opposition: it gets caustic and in some: dehumanizing – rejecting “normalizing” a person who is anathema to your values should not meaning losing your own humanity…
“I cannot see how those who have painted themselves into the corner of unlimited loathing for Leader Trump could ever allow his humanity to overcome their fear of his evilness.”
So well said. This is why every time we “press in” to the loathers (or the lovers) for that matter, we are met with an assumption that we are not one of them, and thus worthy of vitriol. You mentioned shrill. That’s where the sadness is for me. I thought our culture had gone to shrill levels over the past several years, but that last several months have been shrill cranked to 11 for sure.
Speaking into shrill seems to be a fruitless exercise, at least that’s my experience when I poke and prod on occasion.
Pray for Voldemort indeed.
Very good.
Yet, I prefer to think of Happy Gilmore rather than your Voldemort. I didn’t vote for Trump (I wrote in Ben Sasse) but I must admit having fun watching “Happy” give the finger to Shooter and his colleagues on election night.
Many are shocked by Happy’s brand of warfare. He doesn’t fight “fair”. He is not artful nor subtle in twisting data to argue a political point. Instead, he just kicks in the groin and refuses to apologize. Is he immoral, uncouth, etc. or are we silly for assuming a fight should be fought fairly?
Who knows how effective Happy will be in the future and I try to be hopeful; yet I struggle to overlook his picking a fight with Bob Barker. But, he is our elected official and – unlike Madonna – I don’t recall Daniel telling Nebuchadnezzar to go suck a …
Exactly. Well said. Like Solzhenitsyn famously pointed out, “The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either–but right through every human heart.” Including mine.
Some of us inwardly cringed while praying for “Barack, our President” every Sunday.
Some of us now inwardly cringe while praying for “Donald, our President” every Sunday.
What is important is that we did pray and continue to pray for our President and others in authority that they may be given the “wisdom and strength to know and to do [the Lord’s] will.”
Yes. Thank you.
In the words of Linus via Charles via Matthew via a multitude of angels via Dad “glory to God in the highest and on earth PEACE goodwill toward all people”.
Praying and forgiving…yes, while continuing to do my part to prevent our beloved country from going to &*%$*% IN A HAND-BASKET! Yup, that’s me being shrill, when our rights are at stake, and possibly our future. Forgive me.
I think all of us are well-advised to look at ourselves when we react with strong negativity to anyone or anything. What repulses us is likely to be something that relates closely to our own shadow sides, those propensities we work hard to conceal from ourselves and from others, but which nevertheless affect our own thoughts and actions. When I think of that operating in my own reactions to the person who now occupies the White House, it terrifies me, but when I take courage and look, I find I am reacting to the kind of arrogance of which I myself am capable, the self-centeredness that I must consciously battle in my own life, my own incuriosity that allows me to reach for dualistic answers rather than delving into the complexity of societal problems, the self-protective anger that has me speaking rashly rather than listening, etc, etc, etc. I can certainly pray for Voldemort; I can feel pity for Voldemort. I pray for and feel pity for Trump, for I know that much of what I despise about him springs from sources I am all too familiar with in myself.
Such a good reminder of how God looks on us all and lives us through Jesus
Supposed to be loves us not lives us-autocorrect!
satan lives in Autocorrect
I will have solidarity with you if I am able to be a “Hater” with you regarding Autocorrect, per #4 within https://mbird.mystagingwebsite.com/2017/02/another-week-ends-food-drink-sermons-snackadiums-apologies-haters-finders-and-keepers/
…yet not the solidarity that comes with dating. Just a fellow Autocorrect combater.
Cheers!
I don’t think Trump is the Great Satan incarnate, at least not yet, although he does look at times to be aspiring to all the selfish, power hungry, community crushing attributes of that possibly mythical being. But it is just too facile to point the mirror back at the observer and say, Ye who are without sin, cast away. As my dad used to say, you don’t have to jump off the Golden Gate to know the fall will kill you. It is possible for rational people, even we impure, to observe and project and yes, judge, the fruit of a person’s labor. I too “fail at kindness, compassion, and judgment every day.” I can see Trump as flawed, “a human” like me. But I ask for my president to be better than me, to think broadly about the nation and the world, and to hold the most vulnerable as important as the least needy. And therefore, to act accordingly. It is this intention that separates great leaders from autocrats and incompetents. Anything less chooses Evil as a companion if not a spiritual advisor.
I think you have it exactly right: the President should at least feel better than the rest of us – and ckearly Trump is different from “better” and in many ways is everything that deeply disappoints me about our culture – in many ways he has cheapened the office as an institution – but that crime does not fit the punishment, yet, of the hatred that has flooded the internet at his mere election and initial fulfilling of his promises. He may prove worthy of that level of loathing – he has that potential – but that is what I am praying against…
How far do we excuse someone? How far do we allow someone to ruin other people’s lives and create divisions and animosity himself? How far to we let hypocritical go? How LOW do we go in the name of “humanity?”!?
I suppose whether Trump is ‘worthy of that level of loathing” now or ever is a judgment that each observer has to make for her- or himself. In my view, much of what he has expressed and seeks to do is worthy of some level of loathing. Just because I see my own shadow mirrored back to me in Trump does not mean that I share his complicity in the level of evil he is inflcting upon people, the nation, and the world. Letting his disdain for facts and truth, his hypocrisy, has lack of empathy, and even his laziness in learning the things he needs to do the job he holds go is not an option for prudent and moral people. Loathing him, however, is not an answer. We waste ourselves and the resources we need to deal with him and his actions when we loathe him. We need to understand what he is doing, and we need to counter it with condemnation and every ounce of moral fiber and courage we have.
Trump’s victory reminds me of the battle of the Little Big Horn in it’s effect on the liberal American psyche. Just when most educated upper middle class Americans of the late 1800’s were utterly convinced of Manifest Destiny, and the god-given right of the advanced white culture to “re-educate” or annihilate the native population, Little Big Horn happened and Custer and all of his men shockingly were killed by an ignorant horde of savages. Swap Custer for Hillary; swap the Victorian white American flush with its own righteousness after the Civil War for the self-righteous liberal elite at present flush with its success on every social issue; exchange the Native “savages” for the basket of deplorables: there you have it. The after-math of Little Big Horn was for the established order to do absolutely everything in its power to utterly crucify those Native Americans who were foolish or ignorant enough to stand in their holy way. It’s happening again with the utter vilification of Trump and his supporters at every turn.
heard someone compare Trump to Nathaniel….a man with no guile… He is just right out there…i don’t believe he is a fake…i have heard lots of people who know him personally say he is for real….and a man with a big heart… Did you hear Bob(?) Craft talk about how Trump was such a good friend after his wife died?….He and his wife came. as soon as he heard…for a year after he called him every week…..just to see how he was….There are lots of stories like that…. He is a business man for Gods sake…not a politician….i’m glad he won…Can’t imagine Hilliary as our president….