Before You Vote, Please Read The Gospels
You’ve probably seen the lawn signs. They say, Jesus Is My Savior And Donald Trump Is My President.
It’s a comingling of Christianity and MAGA politics that goes back to the 2016 election and also reflects the Jan 6th insurrection at the Capitol where rioters carried placards that said Jesus Saves, images of Jesus in a MAGA hat, and a wooden cross placed near a mock gallows meant to intimidate legislators.
I beg all the people who say that their vote is an expression of their Christianity to read the gospels before voting this time.
Jesus has a lot to say about how we treat one another, especially the poor and marginalized. He doesn’t say a word about transgender people, who seem to be of such concern to many Christian voters. Nor does he expound on homosexuality.
In interviews, many Christian voters say they also are troubled by the number of asylum seekers that have come into the country, citing hysterical rhetoric about immigrants committing violent crimes. It is worth saying repeatedly that immigrants don’t commit violent crimes at a higher rate than American citizens. Even in Aurora CO, a city cited for acts by Venezuelan immigrants, 14 immigrants were arrested for violent crimes. That’s in a city of 400,000.
What gets lost is that most Venezuelans came to the U.S. under a Trump administration program to help those fleeing repression under President Nicolás Maduro. What gets lost too is that Jesus himself was an asylum seeker. His family fled with him to Egypt to escape Herod’s efforts to find the Christ child and kill him.
Rather than vilify the stranger, Jesus reminds us in the gospel of Matthew that he is the stranger we help:
“I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.”
One of the longest parables Jesus offers — and one of the clearest signs of how he thinks we should act — comes in the narrative of the Samaritan, who rescues a man that robbers have left for dead after a priest and a member of the man’s own ethnic group pass him by.
What’s also interesting is that Jesus tells this parable in response to a question: What must I do to inherit eternal life?
What if we looked at immigrants not as a problem, but as a benefit? As people who want to come here to work and forge a better life for themselves and their families. That is the actual truth in a majority of the cases as verified by the many church workers who have been at the southern border trying to help. What if we assisted those seeking to live here to legally find work in order to fill all the “Help Wanted” jobs businesses are posting?
What would Jesus do?
This past week, the gospel of Luke has been prominent in the daily Mass readings. In Luke, Jesus reserves some of his harshest criticisms for those he believes profess one thing and then act differently in their daily lives.
Oh you Pharisees! Although you cleanse the outside of the cup and the dish, inside you are filled with plunder and evil. You fools! he says rather bluntly in Luke 11:37–41.
And later in the same chapter, he compares those who don’t practice what they preach to unseen graves over which people unknowingly walk. He adds, Woe also to your scholars of the law! You impose burdens hard to carry, but you yourselves do not life one finger to touch them.
Jesus’ opponents were many and ended up getting him killed. Still. nowhere in the gospels does Jesus refer to his detractors as “enemies.” Rather he says, You have heard that it was said, ‘Love your neighbor and hate your enemy.’ But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven.
Neither should candidates for office refer to their fellow citizens who disagree with them as “enemies.”
There is not one of us — myself included — who isn’t sometimes guilty of hypocrisy and the failure to live up to every one of Jesus’ teachings. Likewise, no candidate for office is perfect. Each one will hold some position or positions with which we disagree. However, those of us who call ourselves Christian are meant to live by Jesus’ teachings to the best of our ability. We are called to say “No!” and “Enough” to lies, to the sowing of prejudice and division, and the stereotyping of whole groups of people as “other.”
Benedictine Sister and spiritual author Joan Chittister has written a beautiful prayer for choosing leaders. May this prayer and the words of Jesus in the gospels be on our hearts as we cast our vote in November. Here is Sister Joan’s prayer in part:
Give us, O God,
leaders whose hearts are large enough
to match the breadth of our own souls
and give us souls strong enough
to follow leaders of vision and wisdom.
In seeking a leader, let us seek
more than development for ourselves —
though development we hope for —
more than security for our own land —
though security we need —
more than satisfaction for our wants —
though many things we desire …
Give us insight enough ourselves
to choose as leaders those who can tell
strength from power,
growth from greed,
leadership from dominance,
and real greatness
from the trappings of grandiosity …
We ask these things, Great God,
with minds open to your word
and hearts that trust in your eternal care.
Amen.
