Politics

Review: The Real Conversation Jesus Wants Us to Have

/ rtrube54 / Leave a comment
Cover image of "The Real Conversation Jesus Wants Us to Have" by Regina V. Cates

The Real Conversation Jesus Wants Us to Have, Regina V. Cates, foreword by Paula Stone Williams. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. (ISBN: 9780802884107) 2025.

Summary: A pastor imagines what Jesus would want to talk about with Christians in the present moment.

Regina V. Cates invites us to imagine Jesus in conversation with his followers today. She believes he would talk about the abuses of power toward the marginalized and how the church ought love these “neighbors.” Cates thinks he would have a problem with our dogmatic judgementalism toward the “other.” Divisive and corrupt political leadership would deeply disturb him. Jesus would wade into issues we don’t talk about in polite society: sexuality, racism, abortion, toxic masculinity, and more.

Then Cates proceeds to have that conversation in a hard-hitting series of chapters addressing different topics. She pulls no punches, beginning on LGBTQIA+ issues and the church. Cates gets personal, sharing her own painful journey of realizing she was lesbian from an early age in a fundamentalist church. She was sexually assaulted by a sitter and later by a counselor her parents took her to in an effort to “change” her. She was told all such persons are going to hell. No one saw her as a person to be loved. She recounts her own experience of emotional healing in an Inipi sweat lodge. In subsequent chapters, she challenges what she sees as the dogmatism that undergirds what she understands as ancient and misinterpreted texts. She argues that to be religious and moral are two different things.

She describes her remarkable relationship with Byll, an atheist who is one of the kindest people she has met, and who showed her loving acceptance. Then she challenges the “better than arrogance of Christians, challenging us to get ego out of the way. However, all relationships are not like this. Rather, there are times when we must discern when to turn the other cheek and when to responsibly stand up.

She moves on to address other hot-button issues. For example, she argues that “men of quality respect women’s equality” and bluntly addresses sexism and patriarchy and toxic masculinity in the church. This includes male responsibility in matters of sex. She also challenges the church’s complicity in racism and all the ways we try to deny this is a problem. Nor does she mince words about political corruption and our need for leaders of integrity.

Finally, she explores what it means to be a church that embraces all members of the human family. This includes becoming places that create secure settings for the healing of trauma. Ultimately, this means becoming places where we love as Jesus loved.

While I would respectfully differ with the author in my understanding of some biblical texts concerning human sexuality, it broke my heart to read of her experiences in her fundamentalist church. No interpretation of scripture or dogma requires or justifies how the church treated her or what they taught.

Likewise, it saddens me that so many former fundamentalists and evangelicals are writing books like this. In a way, it makes the author’s point that there is a conversation Jesus wants us to have. For example, I grieve that so many men have treated women so badly. As Cates observes, true partnership in ministry does not diminish men. Rather, such men are the real superheroes.

Finally, is this the book to read about the real conversation the church needs to have? While there is much I would affirm in this book, it felt like I’d read this book before and for me, it did not break new ground. That said, this book certainly could spark needed conversations for those open and honest and secure enough with each other to have them.

____________________

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher for review.

Review: The Political Transformation of David Tod

/ rtrube54 / 7 Comments

The Political Transformation of David Tod, Joseph Lambert, Jr. Kent, OH: The Kent State University Press, 2023.

Summary, A biography of Governor David Tod from Youngstown, focusing on his political career and his transformation as a “War Democrat” from support of popular sovereignty to supporting the Union war effort and ultimately Emancipation.

Growing up in Youngstown, I’ve long known of David Tod as one of our most illustrious citizens. In particular, I was familiar with the Tod farm at Brier Hill, first settled by his father George, also a state lawmaker, but not a very successful farmer. David’s success as a lawyer allowed him to acquire and pay off the farm, allowing his parents to live out their years there. His act set the stage for the discovery of high quality coal, the construction of blast furnaces contributing to the growth of the iron industry in the valley and his stake in rail companies, enabling the shipment of coal and iron from the Mahoning Valley, establishing his fortune.

Beyond knowing that he served a two-year term as Ohio’s governor during the Civil War, I was unaware of the political career of David Tod. Joseph Lambert’s new book opened my eyes to the political career of Tod, from its beginnings in Warren to the statehouse. I was unaware that the first part of his career centered around Warren Ohio, where he got his first taste of politics. From 1825, when he went to read law in the firm of Roswell Stone until 1841, when his father died, Tod’s activities centered around Warren, the bustling county seat of Trumbull County, of which Youngstown, then a township, was still a part. Admitted to the bar in 1827, by 1832, he was named postmaster by Andrew Jackson. Brief stints as a councilman and as Warren’s mayor were followed by election as a Democrat to Ohio’s state senate. He left after one, two year term, returned briefly to Warren, and then took over the Brier Hill farm after his father’s death.

Lambert shows how Tod’s political activities went along with the development of business, whether speaking for other candidates, or running twice, unsuccessfully, for governor. Then, in 1847 he was named ambassador to Brazil, replacing an ambassador with a fraught relationship with the Brazilian government. Lambert shows how Tod, with no previous diplomatic experience both represented U.S interests well while winning the favor of the Brazilians. His exposure to the slave trade confirmed his personal opposition to slavery.

However, in returning to the states, he was caught up in the debates on slavery. Ohio was a microcosm of slavery, with the north being staunchly abolitionist, and southern Ohio much more favorable to the institution just across the river. As a Democrat, he was part of a national party trying to bridge sectional difference. Before the war, he supported Stephen Douglas against Lincoln and Douglas’s position of popular sovereignty and leaving slavery in the south alone, hoping it would wither of its own accord.

Lambert shows how Tod’s politics were shaped by the constitution, which upheld slavery, and how they evolved over the course of the war. Since the Union was also created by this constitution, he vigorously supported Lincoln when hostilities began. After personal efforts to raise troops, Tod, as part of a Union Party of War Democrats and Republicans was elected Governor in 1862, widely respected around the state.

This didn’t last long. His arrest of Clement Vanlandingham brought charges of being an iron-handed dictator. He faced sniping from his own party. But he met Lincoln’s calls for troups, cared for returning soldiers, and particularly the wounded, guarded the state’s borders, and managed the state’s finances. During this time, as the war progressed, he slowly moved to support emancipation and to eventually allow Blacks from Ohio to serve in the military, a significant transformation, and one that alienated him from the Democrats. After the war, he could not go back. As the 14th and 15th amendments were proposed, he moved to support Black citizenship and suffrage, the latter a corollary in his mind.

Lambert portrays Tod as tireless in campaigning, in or out of office, to the detriment of his health. He refused Lincoln’s appointment as secretary of the Treasury for health reasons. While campaigning, he suffered several “apoplectic strokes” and died of this in 1868, although Lambert raises interesting questions of whether these “strokes” may have been malarial in origin, given the description of symptoms.

The portrait of Tod is one of a savvy businessman and politician, although a man of great personal generosity and integrity. He balanced Ohio’s interests and security with unstinting support of the Union effort. He devoted significant attention to the welfare of soldiers. He handled loss with grace. And he put Union and the constitution ahead of political party, growing, albeit slowly, in his commitment to emancipation and basic rights of Blacks. Though never a presidential candidate, he might be one of Ohio’s greatest political leaders. Ohio was a key to the Union victory, and Tod’s war leadership a major factor in that. Tod has not received the attention due him. Lambert’s book remedies that. The man who said “I would not have been born anywhere else than in Youngstown if I could” lived a life that should make all of us who grew up in Youngstown proud.

________________________________

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher.

Review: The Religion of American Greatness

/ rtrube54 / 4 Comments

The Religion of American Greatness, Paul D. Miller (Foreword by David French). Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2022.

Summary: A conservative’s critique of Christian nationalism, distinguishing it from patriotism, and making a case against it both biblically and as an illiberal theory that is at odds with the American experiment of a constitutional democratic republic.

What first caught my attention with this book is that it is written by a White, theologically conservative, Afghanistan war veteran who served in the George W. Bush White House and at the CIA as an intelligence analyst, is pro-life, lives in Texas, and reads the Declaration of Independence to his kids on the Fourth of July. He is also a Georgetown University professor who offers a scholarly treatment that both carefully explains Christian nationalism on its own terms and offers a well-supported critique of it, both as a Christian and as a patriot who passionately believes in the American experiment.

He begins as all good academics by discussing what nationalism is and differentiates it from patriotism, which he supports. He offers this definition:

“Nationalism is the belief that humanity is divisible into internally coherent, mutually distinct cultural units which merit political independence and human loyalty because of their purported ability to provide meaning, purpose, and value in human life; and that governments are supposed to protect and promote the cultural identities of their respective nations” (p. 5).

He then looks at the American version of this, arguing that the particular cultural identity that American nationalists seek to protect is Anglo-Protestantism. What is problematic with this is that cultural identities have blurry boundaries that don’t align with political boundaries. The consequence is illiberal forms of government that marginalize and disadvantage ethnic, religious, linguistic, and other cultural groupings, treating them as second class citizens. Far from promoting national unity, this results in fragmentation and division.

The Christian, evangelical version of this takes a universal faith and weds it to identity politics, reducing it to a tribal faith rather than a faith for every tribe. Miller spends a good deal of time discussing the concepts of “nations” and “peoples” in the Bible and argues that the template of Israel cannot be used to uphold the United States as a uniquely chosen nation under God. He concludes that Christian nationalism is a form of idolatry. He traces the uneasy tension between nationalism and republicanism throughout the history of the Christian right.

Whereas other commentators of a more progressive bent automatically associate Christian nationalism with racism, Miller focuses on the illiberality of nationalism in how it thinks about race, inequality, and naming and remedying the sins of the past. Some may consider this a distinction without a difference, but I appreciate the measured tone and the focus on consequences rather than on the labels we apply.

He discusses the embrace of the former president’s form of Christian nationalism and its attraction for White evangelicals. One of the most telling aspects of this discussion is the suspicion of elites as well as the fear of elite efforts to restrict religious expression. I’ve experienced that in university ministry where universities used institutional power to attempt to restrict access of religious groups on campus (and I met the contributor of the foreword, David French, in conjunction with standing against these efforts). I observed the condescension with which religious convictions were treated. I chose to love those who treated me as an enemy but I can understand how this sense of grievance can be played upon to oppose and defeat “progressive elites,” something I think few progressives really grasp. Miller observes that “while conservatives are proud of their bubble, progressives deny they are in one.”

Miller concludes in arguing that national identity is not bad–we just need a better story than nationalism, one rooted in our history that both celebrates our ideals, especially as they have distinguished us in practice, as well as our ugly failures, that inspire us to overcome and strive for a better future. He argues for a kind of open exceptionalism in which we hold the nation up to the light of our high ideals combined with Niebuhrian humility that faces our national sins and failures. He believes pastors can do a better job in careful teaching that gives the lie to the idea of America as the new Israel, chosen of God and thinking beyond specific issues as to how to engage politically in a pluralistic society and the duties of responsible citizenship.

Miller is self-aware enough to recognize that many Christian nationalists won’t read his book. I hope some will because they will meet someone who actually cares about much of what they care for, who genuinely loves America, and is equally critical of progressives for their own brand of illiberalism. He writes as one who sees the religion of American greatness as an idol, a counterfeit version of the great vision of our faith of God’s love for all the nations of the earth. Miller is unwilling to see it reduced to one puny White evangelical tribe identified with a mere vision of national identity.

He also sees nationalist efforts, Christian or otherwise, as incongruous with our national experiment of a constitutional form of democratic republicanism. He alludes to writing not only a similar critique of progressivism but also a book outlining his ideas of a “framework of ordered liberty.” I hope he gets to write both of those books, but especially the third, which I think will offer great help for all of those who want to think politically beyond the issues that so often divide us.

____________________

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher.

Politics, Partisanship, and Partisanism

/ rtrube54 / 3 Comments
Photo by Joshua Sukoff on Unsplash

It’s always been etiquette in social situations to avoid religion and politics. Fights about these two important areas of life are not a new thing. I would contend though that what has occurred in our time is a move beyond politics and beyond partisanship to partisanism. Let me explain what I mean.

Politics: I know people who say they just don’t want to talk about politics. I haven’t figured out how we live without talking about politics. “Politics” comes from the Greek polis, the word for city, and has to do at root with the affairs of the city. The city was the state in ancient Greece. Since then, we have created additional levels of politics at state and national levels. Decisions about school curriculums, trash pick up and recycling services, policing, the creation and maintenance of state parks, the right of way of roads, what taxes we pay, and the regulations that govern interstate travel all are political.

Politics exist because more of us exist than simply our own households. We all have our ideas of what makes a good place, a good society. Politics is the process of how we figure out together how human societies best flourish. Good political processes are essential to a healthy society. When these processes cease to function well in promoting the common good, social orders deteriorate. Not all at once, perhaps. Societies may live for a while on the capital of formerly constructive political processes. I think that is our current predicament.

Partisanship: If you have two human beings, you probably have disagreements. Often, a number of people will take the same side against others. In many countries there are multiple groups with particular interests. Partisanship is not necessarily a bad thing because it allows diverse interests to have a voice in political decisions all have to live with. Effective politics recognizes the situations that need to be addressed for the health of a society, allows different voices to be heard, and arrives at compromises that aren’t perfect, but work, at least imperfectly for everyone. Healthy partisanship ensures that all the citizens are considered and that political solutions are ideally common good solutions, not favoring some citizens over others. Partisans keep in mind that they represent a certain interest but also serve those with different interests. Maintaining that tension is important if you believe in the equality and value of all your citizens.

Partisanism: I looked. It is actually a word. I see partisanism as a distortion of healthy partisanship. It is where party ideals become ideology and there is a kind of absolutism about it that says we are right and they are wrong. The point is not seeking some form of common good, but simply the good of our party, our group. Wrong people don’t deserve good. Partisanism stirs up a religious fervor befitting the fact that it is an -ism. If partisanism can’t get its way it obstructs and often complains that the other side is unwilling to compromise. What is really the case is that the extreme positions sides are forced to in these situations brook no compromise–only winners and losers. Nothing is left on the table. We only allow either/or. There is no room to consider both/and.

Partisanism at its worst becomes political extremism in which pretenses of principle are jettisoned for the ruthless exercise of power. It might be a form of fascism on the right or a form of statism on the left. In history, this always ends badly in the loss of human rights, and often, a succession of violence.

As a follower of Christ, I believe both that politics reflects an aspect of the “culture mandate” given Adam and Eve and that in a world of finite and fallen human beings the best that can ever be obtained are proximate goods. Any move toward the absolutism of partisanism and political extremism ignores these realities and substitutes an earthly kingdom for a heavenly one. Hence, I believe at best politicians work for proximate solutions that listen to and serve all those represented by them. I believe it is essential that our parties strive toward this kind of political work and that as a citizenry, we support that work and stop vilifying political compromise and negotiation. Might we release a kind of creativity when we free politicians from the tyranny of “either/or” politics to explore what “both/and” might look like?

I hope those of you reading don’t try to argue with me about what “they” did, whoever “they” are. I’m not interested in those arguments because I’m not interested in that kind of partisanism. I don’t mind a politics where we have different ideas of the common good as long as the common good of all our citizens is our aim. Any other politics is unworthy of us because implicitly we are saying that there are some Americans we don’t need, some Americans who don’t count, some who don’t have the same value as human beings. I’ve watched us espouse the idea of all being created equal on July 4 and ignore it the rest of the year for too long. We won’t get it perfect but a politics that relentless pursued the common good, and vigorously resisted partisanism, could get it better. No matter your party, that’s a politics worth talking about.

Review: Christ and the Kingdoms of Men

/ rtrube54 / 2 Comments

Christ and the Kingdoms of Men, David C. Innes, foreword by Carl R. Trueman. Phillipsburg, NJ: P & R Publishing, 2020.

Summary: Explores the civic and political responsibilities of Christians and the proper purposes of government.

This past electoral season underscores the urgency for the need of principled foundations for our political life and civic engagement. Here, as elsewhere, Christians ought look first at the foundations of their faith, as revealed in the scriptures. David C. Innes sets out to do this. It is important to note at outset that this is framed within a Reformed perspective reflecting theological convictions of Calvin and Abraham Kuyper.

Innes begins by grounding this theology in the Kingdom of God, revealed in his rule over creation, working through the vice-regency of human beings, even pre-fall, to fill and govern the creation, and in a fallen world, to provide various institutions of authority from the family to government to restrain evil and to provide for peaceable conditions allowing people to flourish secure in their life, health and possessions. With the coming of Christ comes not only redemption but the inauguration of God’s kingdom or rule that will transcend all earthly kingdoms, of which we are still necessarily a part, until the return of Christ.

Centering on Romans 13:1-7, Innes develops the proper role of government in the punishment of evil, protecting life and property, and positively protecting the exercise of piety and morality and liberty. Good governments praise the good. The challenge is governing in a fallen world, one where trust may not be assumed. Innes writes thoughtfully about the “political problem,” the tension between the power involved in government’s exercise of its proper role, and the restraints needed against excessive power. He explores Lockean government, upon which western democracies are modelled, both in the limits placed upon government and the creation of individual self-sovereignty under the law and its assertion of radical personal freedom.

Innes would argue for an ordered civil society in place of radical individualism, with limited government by the consent of governed under the rule of law. Running through this is the idea of subsidiarity, that what can be done at a lower level ought not be done at a higher or central one. Rights are what we would expect of one another. Following Romans 13, the proper response of one is submission to the government, save where this conflicts to obedience to God.

Up to this point, I would find myself in basic agreement. It is where Innes goes with the question of resistance that troubled me. He speaks of the role of inferior magistrates who ought act when those above them fail to act in the interest of the people. By this, he offers theological justification for the American Revolution. My problem is two-fold, at least. I do not find this principle of the inferior magistrate in scripture but only cited by the author in Calvin’s Institutes. Secondly, the same principle has been used to justify nullification in the lead up to the Civil War, and the secession of states that led to this costly and bloody war. Some use similar principles to argue for overturning authorities exercising public health powers in pandemics by mandating masks and other prudent measures for the common good (while ignoring ordinary measures like traffic laws that exist for similar reasons). At very least, it seems this idea, unless hedged about by the rule of law, may be arbitrary and dangerous to the public order.

I’m also troubled that this is the only form of resistance Innes proposes. I do not find any treatment of either the prophetic resistance of the Old Testament, nor the faithful resistance of the church against empire evident in Revelation. I do not see him put forward warrants for protest and non-violent resistance on the part of citizens that arguably in many societies has brought about political changes (I think of the Velvet Revolution of the Czech Republic). It does not seem that Innes envisions a society where people are subject to political oppression and do not have “inferior magistrates” to act on their behalf, unless this doctrine allows that leaders of such movements act in this role.

However, I must commend Innes on the concluding chapter for his discussion of citizenship and statesmanship. I do find here some of what I missed in the previous chapter in the role of a good citizen under tyranny. In more ordinary times, he also stresses the civic duties of citizens in the pursuit of the common good and the role of those who govern as statesmen who work, even in a pluralistic society, to preserve the liberties of all and the common good.

I think Innes offers a good, clear outline of a Reformed theology of government and the citizen. I would suggest that if one wants to read in this area, one not confine oneself to this book, but read more widely. Some suggestions may be found in the recommended readings. I would also suggest James Skillen’s The Good of Politics (review). Skillen comes out of the Reformed tradition, but draws on a much wider array of sources. However, this book lays out good basic groundwork for the basis and purpose and limits of government within God’s purposes, and the proper role of citizens.

____________________________

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. The opinions I have expressed are my own.

Review: Compassion (&) Conviction

/ rtrube54 / 1 Comment

Compassion (&) Conviction, Justin Giboney, Michael Wear, and Chris Butler, Foreword by Barbara Williams-Skinner. Downers Grove: InterVarsity Press, 2020.

Summary: A handbook for better political and civic engagement, overcoming the highly polarized character of our current discourse and the unhealthy assimilation of the church into politics.

I, like so many of you, struggle increasingly with two things. One is the character of our political discourse, that turns everything into an either-or choice, down to the wearing of masks in a pandemic, a practice uncontroversial throughout most of the world. The other is the increasing captivity and assimilation of blocks of Christians into our political divisions, on both conservative and progressive sides, where Christian ethics and convictions on a range of matters must be muted in the pursuit of a few political aims. The Anabaptist in me is tempted to flee it all, branding it as “just politics,” a mere shadow of the polis of the church, the harbinger of God’s in-breaking kingdom. And yet, I see the examples of believing people in scripture and history whose faithful lives and witness functioned redemptively within political structures. And government, around which our politics revolve, is a God-ordained structure to bring order and justice within society, and, when at its best, to protect the most vulnerable among us.

The authors of this book, described as “the AND Campaign’s guide to faithful civic engagement” renew my hope that a better form of political and civic engagement is still possible. The AND Campaign‘s stated aim is:

TO EDUCATE AND ORGANIZE CHRISTIANS FOR CIVIC AND CULTURAL ENGAGEMENT THAT RESULTS IN BETTER REPRESENTATION, MORE JUST AND COMPASSIONATE POLICIES AND A HEALTHIER POLITICAL CULTURE.

This book combines principle and practice to flesh out that aim. The authors begin by setting politics within the broader Christian mission, contending that faithfulness always comes before political wins. They offer a civics lesson on how our government is constituted and the First Amendment protections both from a state church and the state’s intrusion into the life of the church. This does not preclude the influence of Christian principles in political discussions pursuing the common good. The authors emphasize how our engagement must be shaped by compassion and conviction, love and justice. They discuss how we engage partnerships and partisanship without losing our identity. They offer guidelines for messaging that is clear, well-researched, persuasive, loving, and convictional. They give clear-eyed direction for engaging racial injustices and pursuing racial reconciliation while avoiding destructive mobs. They instruct readers in effective advocacy. And they offer practical guidelines for maintaining civility.

I particularly appreciated the following guidelines for partnerships and partisanship:

  1. Be confident in your identity in Christ.
  2. Get to know your partners and understand their endgame.
  3. Identify the objective and shared values.
  4. Identify differences and conflicting views.
  5. Don’t isolate the issue.
  6. Don’t take on your partner’s identity.
  7. Protect against losing your identity through active critique. (pp. 69-72)

All this underscores two major themes of this book. One is the theme of AND in a time of either-or. Their approach is one of reconciliation, that cares for both fetuses and mother, for both people of color and police. Yet it is also an approach grounded in truth and justice. The authors repeatedly speak of pro-life convictions, they uphold advocacy, oppose systemic racism, and counsel avoiding those who would engage in destructive mob violence.

The second theme is that our political and civic engagement, as every area of life must be shaped by our mission and ethics as Christians. We must never submerge our identity for political aims, no matter how good and holy those aims may seem. We are to do this confidently but humbly, not arrogantly, and to love those who oppose us.

It is a time when the only alternatives for Christians appear to be political captivity and assimilation or isolation that withdraws from and political involvements. The authors invite us to principled and loving engagement in civic and political affairs as acts of Christian faithfulness that undergird rather than undermine our Christian witness. They offer biblical principles and practical guidelines. This is a vital book for such a time as this.

________________________________

Disclosure of Material Connection: I received a complimentary review copy of this book from the publisher. The opinions I have expressed are my own.