Prayers for the Trump Presidency

St. Mary Baptist Church, Port Barre, LA, burned down on 26 March 2019

[Since Franklin Graham found it a good thing to call for a "SPECIAL Day of Prayer" for Donald Trump, I thought it meet and right to put together a prayer service. I'm pretty sure it's not what Graham meant, but, oh well.] 

Opening Sentence 

V. Because that he remembered not to shew mercy, but persecuted the poor and needy man, that he might even slay the broken in heart.
R. Let his days be few; and let another take his office.
Glory be…

Collect 

O God, the source of change, break all chains, stop all wars, and end the hate which causes both, so that your people may live with peace and freedom in Jesus Christ our Liberator. Through the same…

Reading: 1 Kings 21:1-16 

And it came to pass after these things, that Naboth the Jezreelite had a vineyard, which was in Jezreel, hard by the palace of Ahab king of Samaria. And Ahab spake unto Naboth, saying, Give me thy vineyard, that I may have it for a garden of herbs, because it is near unto my house: and I will give thee for it a better vineyard than it; or, if it seem good to thee, I will give thee the worth of it in money. And Naboth said to Ahab, The Lord forbid it me, that I should give the inheritance of my fathers unto thee. And Ahab came into his house heavy and displeased because of the word which Naboth the Jezreelite had spoken to him: for he had said, I will not give thee the inheritance of my fathers. And he laid him down upon his bed, and turned away his face, and would eat no bread. But Jezebel his wife came to him, and said unto him, Why is thy spirit so sad, that thou eatest no bread? And he said unto her, Because I spake unto Naboth the Jezreelite, and said unto him, Give me thy vineyard for money; or else, if it please thee, I will give thee another vineyard for it: and he answered, I will not give thee my vineyard. And Jezebel his wife said unto him, Dost thou now govern the kingdom of Israel? arise, and eat bread, and let thine heart be merry: I will give thee the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite. So she wrote letters in Ahab's name, and sealed them with his seal, and sent the letters unto the elders and to the nobles that were in his city, dwelling with Naboth. And she wrote in the letters, saying, Proclaim a fast, and set Naboth on high among the people: And set two men, sons of Belial, before him, to bear witness against him, saying, Thou didst blaspheme God and the king. And then carry him out, and stone him, that he may die. And the men of his city, even the elders and the nobles who were the inhabitants in his city, did as Jezebel had sent unto them, and as it was written in the letters which she had sent unto them. They proclaimed a fast, and set Naboth on high among the people. And there came in two men, children of Belial, and sat before him: and the men of Belial witnessed against him, even against Naboth, in the presence of the people, saying, Naboth did blaspheme God and the king. Then they carried him forth out of the city, and stoned him with stones, that he died. Then they sent to Jezebel, saying, Naboth is stoned, and is dead. And it came to pass, when Jezebel heard that Naboth was stoned, and was dead, that Jezebel said to Ahab, Arise, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, which he refused to give thee for money: for Naboth is not alive, but dead. And it came to pass, when Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, that Ahab rose up to go down to the vineyard of Naboth the Jezreelite, to take possession of it.

Psalm 10 

Why standest thou afar off, O Lord? why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble?
The wicked in his pride doth persecute the poor: let them be taken in the devices that they have imagined.
For the wicked boasteth of his heart's desire, and blesseth the covetous, whom the Lord abhorreth.
The wicked, through the pride of his countenance, will not seek after God: God is not in all his thoughts.
His ways are always grievous; thy judgments are far above out of his sight: as for all his enemies, he puffeth at them.
He hath said in his heart, I shall not be moved: for I shall never be in adversity.
His mouth is full of cursing and deceit and fraud: under his tongue is mischief and vanity.
He sitteth in the lurking places of the villages: in the secret places doth he murder the innocent: his eyes are privily set against the poor.
He lieth in wait secretly as a lion in his den: he lieth in wait to catch the poor: he doth catch the poor, when he draweth him into his net.
He croucheth, and humbleth himself, that the poor may fall by his strong ones.
He hath said in his heart, God hath forgotten: he hideth his face; he will never see it.
Arise, O Lord; O God, lift up thine hand: forget not the humble.
Wherefore doth the wicked contemn God? he hath said in his heart, Thou wilt not require it.
Thou hast seen it; for thou beholdest mischief and spite, to requite it with thy hand: the poor committeth himself unto thee; thou art the helper of the fatherless.
Break thou the arm of the wicked and the evil man: seek out his wickedness till thou find none.
The Lord is King for ever and ever: the heathen are perished out of his land.
Lord, thou hast heard the desire of the humble: thou wilt prepare their heart, thou wilt cause thine ear to hear:
To judge the fatherless and the oppressed, that the man of the earth may no more oppress.

Reading: Revelation 13:1-9 

And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority. And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him? And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months. And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven. And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations. And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. If any man have an ear, let him hear.

Verse  

V. Though ye offer me burnt offerings and your meat offerings, I will not accept them: neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts.Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols.
R. But let justice run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.

Alleluia, Alleluia. The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he hath anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor; he hath sent me to heal the brokenhearted, to preach deliverance to the captives, and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty them that are bruised, to preach the acceptable year of the Lord. Alleluia.

Gospel: Matthew 25:31-46 

When the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory: And before him shall be gathered all nations: and he shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth his sheep from the goats: And he shall set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left. Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me in: Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me. Then shall the righteous answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, and fed thee? or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw we thee a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and came unto thee? And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me. Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: For I was an hungred, and ye gave me no meat: I was thirsty, and ye gave me no drink: I was a stranger, and ye took me not in: naked, and ye clothed me not: sick, and in prison, and ye visited me not. Then shall they also answer him, saying, Lord, when saw we thee an hungred, or athirst, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister unto thee? Then shall he answer them, saying, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye did it not to one of the least of these, ye did it not to me. And these shall go away into everlasting punishment: but the righteous into life eternal.

Litany of Deliverance 

From prison and detention camps, from unjust incarceration and from unjust sentences: Good Lord, deliver us.
From crowding and eviction, from hunger and unemployment: Good Lord, deliver us.
From neglect by parents, from neglect by children, from neglect by callous institutions: Good Lord, deliver us.
From starvation and epidemic, from overcrowding of the planet, from pollution of the soil, the air, and the waters: Good Lord, deliver us.
From poverty and disease, from segregation and prejudice, from harassment, discrimination, and brutality: Good Lord, deliver us.
From racism and affluence; from the concentration of power in the hands of ignorant, threatened, avaricious, or hasty men: Good Lord, deliver us.
From propaganda and untruthfulness: Good Lord, deliver us.
From arrogance and unfeeling, narrowness and meanness, from stupidity and pretense: Good Lord, deliver us.
From boredom, apathy, and fatigue, from lack of conviction, from fear, self-satisfaction, and timidity: Good Lord, deliver us.
From retribution at the hands of our victims, from the consequences of our own folly: Good Lord, deliver us.
From resignation and despair, from cynicism and manipulation: Good Lord, deliver us.
From the tyranny of evil men in high office: Good Lord, deliver us.
Through all unmerited suffering, our own and others': Good Lord, deliver us.
Through the unending cry of all peoples for justice and freedom: Good Lord, deliver us.
Through all concern and wonder, love and creativity: Good Lord, deliver us.
In our strength and weakness, in occasional success and eventual failure: Good Lord, deliver us.
In aloneness and community, in the days of our action and the time of our dying: Good Lord, deliver us.
By the needs of mankind and of the earth, and not by our own merits or deserving: Good Lord, deliver us.
Deliver us, Good Lord, open our eyes and unstop our ears, so that we may see the figures of the saints and hear their witness: Good Lord, deliver us.

Intercessions 

For the poor and hungry, for migrant workers and the homeless, the outcast and unemployed: Lord, hear our prayer. 
For single mothers and for children unwanted in their homes: Lord, hear our prayer.
For the wounded, for prisoners and exiles, for all who are persecuted because of conscience or resistance: Lord, hear our prayer.
For the sick and suffering in mind or body: Lord, hear our prayer.
For the mortgaged and manipulated, fearful of crime and competition, pawns in a game of the affluent: Lord, hear our prayer.
For prostitutes; for policemen, jailers, and soldiers; for all prisoners of a degraded and degrading system: Lord, hear our prayer.
For authorities and officials, that they may listen to the voice of the different and weak: Lord, hear our prayer.
For oppressors and exploiters, that they may be confused and disarmed by love: Lord, hear our prayer.
For the masters of war, that they may be given a new transplant of flesh in place of their heart of stone: Lord, hear our prayer.
For all whom we fear, resent, or cannot love; for the unlovable: Lord, hear our prayer.
For those who are dying and have died, in bitterness or tranquility: Lord, hear our prayer.
For doctors, nurses, and social workers, for ministers to the poor: Lord, hear our prayer.
For organizers, students, and writers, all who raise the cry for justice: Lord, hear our prayer.
In thankfulness for all who have been freed from prison, poverty, illness, or fear: Lord, hear our prayer.
For all those things we are not wise enough to ask for ourselves: We call on the Spirit.
We call on the Spirit to bind us in solidarity with all who are using their lives to resist evil and affirm community. Amen.

Prayer for the President

O God our only strength, look with indignation and pity on N., the President of these United States. Break down the fence around his White House that his corrupt heart might be converted and he should heed the cry for justice rising from the suffering people of this land. Teach him that peace is not built by killing, nor justice by repression. Make him the servant and not the exploiter of his people, after the example of Jesus, his Liberator and ours. Through the same...

V. No servant can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon.
R. We ought to obey God rather than men.

Let us go forth in peace.
Thanks be to God.

[Collect, Litany, and Intercessory Prayers adapted from The Covenant of Peace, a Liberation Prayer Book by the Free Church of Berkeley, 1971.]

Items of Interest: Holy Week

The Democrats’ White-People Problem
by Joan Williams (The Atlantic). «As early as the 1680s, powerful white people were serving up racism to assuage the injuries of class, elevating the status of white indentured servants over that of enslaved black people. Some two centuries later, W. E. B. Du Bois observed that poor white people were compensated partly by a “public and psychological wage”—the “wages of whiteness,” as the historian David Roediger memorably put it. These wages pit people of different races against one another, averting a coalition based on shared economic interests.»

Do Americans Know How Much Trouble They’re In?
by Umair Haque (Eudaimonia & Co.). «America is at a crossroads. A point of no return. A democratic society cannot really survive the three assaults above, and go on being one. They may seem like just daily events in the ongoing sad saga of a troubled nation — but they are not just that. They contain great significance to history, which I feel American intellectuals are doing a poor job of interpreting and presenting to the American people.»

When White People Are Uncomfortable, Black People Are Silenced
by Rachel Elizabeth Cargle (Harper's Bazaar). «Silencing happens when, for white people, hearing the truth is too much; when the truth hangs so painfully heavy on their shoulders that they’d rather get rid of the weight, than actually face the issue head on.»

The Southern Poverty Law Center Is Everything That’s Wrong With Liberalism
by Nathan J. Robinson (Current Affairs) «The Southern Poverty Law Center perfectly shows social change done wrong. It was a top-down organization controlled by an incompetent and venal leadership. It was hypocritical in the extreme, preaching anti-racism while fostering a racist internal culture and being led by men whose own commitment to equality was questionable. It didn’t care about listening to and incorporating the viewpoints of the people it was supposed to serve. It was obscenely rich in a time of terrible poverty, and squandered much its considerable wealth. Finally, it picked the wrong political targets, and focused on symbolic over substantive change. Each of these practices goes beyond the SPLC, and is endemic to a certain kind of “elite liberalism” that desires “progress” without sacrifice. It is the kind of liberalism recognized by Phil Ochs in 1966, and its chief characteristics are a deep hypocrisy and a lack of willingness to seriously challenge the status quo.»

The Sermon Dr. King Didn't Get to Preach

As we commemorate the 51st anniversary of the martyrdom of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., let us consider the words of his last sermon, written 51 years ago today, a sermon he was never able to deliver.

Why America May Go to Hell

My dear friends, my dear friend James Lawson, and all of these dedicated and distinguished ministers of the Gospel assembled here tonight, to all of the sanitation workers and their families, and to all of my brothers and sisters, I need not pause to say how very delighted I am to be in Memphis tonight, to see you here in such large and enthusiastic numbers.

As I came in tonight, I turned around and said to Ralph Abernathy, “They really have a great movement here in Memphis.” You’ve been demonstrating something here that needs to be demonstrated all over the country. You are demonstrating that we can stick together. You are demonstrating that we are all tied in a single garment of destiny, and that if one black person suffers, if one black person is down, we are all down.

If you will judge anything here in this struggle, you’re commanding that this city will respect the dignity of labor. So often we overlook the worth and significance of those who are not in professional jobs, or those who are not in the so-called big jobs. But let me say to you tonight, that whenever you are engaged in work that serves humanity, and is for the building of humanity, it has dignity, and it has worth. One day our society must come to see this. One day our society will come to respect the sanitation worker if it is to survive. For the person who picks up our garbage, in the final analysis, is as significant as the physician. All labor has worth.

You are doing another thing. You are reminding, not only Memphis, but you are reminding the nation that it is a crime for people to live in this rich nation and receive starvation wages. I need not remind you that this is the plight of our people all over America. The vast majority of Negroes in our country are still perishing on a lonely island of poverty in the midst of a vast ocean of material prosperity. My friends, we are living as a people in a literal depression. Now you know when there is vast unemployment and underemployment in the black community, they call it a social problem. When there is vast unemployment and underemployment in the white community they call it a depression. But we find ourselves living in a literal depression all over this country as a people.

Continue Reading...

Items of Interest: Fourth Week of Lent

When Fighting Racism Meant Fighting Economic Exploitation
an interview with Erik Gellman (Jacobin). «Though often forgotten today, the National Negro Congress forged a black-led, labor-based coalition in New Deal America that fought white supremacy and the economic exploitation that undergirded it.»

A Field Guide to Bad Faith Arguments
by Aaron Huertas (Medium). Bad faith arguments are common in politics. And while they’ve always been part of political culture, they’re much more rampant on social media. It’s easy to fall prey to bad faith arguments and waste time engaging someone on points that obscure rather than shed light on how we’re all affected by policy and politics. So with that in mind, here’s a field guide for spotting and responding to bad faith arguments and staying focused on the real-world issues that matter.»

The Secret History of Anti-Mexican Violence in Texas
by Carlos Kevin Blanton (Texas Monthly). «It's a dynamic that almost anyone who teaches or writes about Texas’s past grapples with. Many of my students at Texas A&M have firm impressions about Texas history. They see it as the story of how barbed and brutal justice tamed a wild land, bringing civilized modernity to the wilderness and spurring moral and spiritual regeneration. These notions are a part of our identity. We read these enduring narratives in the histories of Walter Prescott Webb and T. R. Fehrenbach. We revisit them in our literature and films. We recite these beliefs about the good and necessary violence in Texas like prayers. All states have bloody pasts. But no state bathes itself in it quite like Texas.»

The Christianization of U.S. Foreign Policy
by Kathryn Joyce (The New Republic) Should be titled "The Evangelical Theocrats Take Over U.S. Foreign Policy". «Even amid an administration stacked with evangelical staffers and advisors, Pompeo stands out. As former CIA director he described the “war on terror” as a holy war and said the U.S. “worshipped other gods and called it multiculturalism.” He now readily tells audiences about how he keeps a Bible open on his State Department desk to remind him of God’s truth. One of the driving motivators of Pompeo’s State Department increasingly seems to be what Gardiner calls “well-documented beliefs in the prophetic necessity of the establishment of a ‘Greater Israel’ in order to usher in the End Times”—hardly a stabilizing central principle in an era of nuclear risk. Meanwhile, holding “separate interviews with religious broadcasters,” Gardiner pointed out, means “reaching the white evangelicals who are the single most unwavering part of the voting base of an embattled president.”»

Gluttony
by Henry Karlson (Little Bit of Nothing). «The citizens of Sodom and Gomorrah were prideful in their wealth and power: they used it in excess on themselves, on their inordinate pleasures, to demonstrate their earthly glory; but in their prosperity, they ate away at the resources of the earth, leading to the poor and needy to experience extreme suffering and death. It is in this respect, in the injustice which can be seen tied with gluttony we can begin to understand why gluttony is one of the deadly sins: its nature lies is not in overeating, though that often is a form in which it takes, but in the inordinate taking in of the abundance of the earth at the expense of others, with eating, a necessary function of life, being at the center of the disorder.»

Items of Interest: Third Week of Lent

Where is Jesus in a culture of winning?
by Meghan J. Clark (US Catholic). «When our culture separates so-called winners from losers, the Christian commitment to human dignity is essential. Human dignity is universal and inviolable; it does not need to be earned. For Day, “the gospel takes away our right forever, to discriminate between the deserving and the undeserving poor.”»

Where Do Women Belong? A Critique of Patrick Deneen’s Why Liberalism Failed
by Kristin Kobes Du Mez (KristinDuMez.com). «Yes, we need to critique the shortcomings of modern liberalism. But we also need a better model of authority, one shorn of nostalgia, patriarchy, and dangerous inattention to abuses of power. Without that, our future may be even bleaker than that which Deneen depicts.»

The World Would Be a Better Place Without the Rich
by Sam Pizzigati (Jacobin). «The awesomely affluent have no net redeeming social value.Their presence coarsens our culture, erodes our economic future, and diminishes our democracy. Any society that winks at the monstrously large fortunes that make some people decidedly more equal than others is asking for trouble. But the trouble the rich engender often goes obscured. Most of us will spend our entire existences without ever coming into contact with anyone of enormous means. In the daily rush of our complicated lives, we seldom stop to ponder how those lives could change without a superrich pressing down upon us. So, let’s ponder.»

The Kamala Conundrum
by Michael Harriot (The Root) «Kamala Harris’ flaws might be significant, but the criticism comes from an examination of her policy and her past. Many of the people who love Harris have seen her on television ripping apart her conservative counterparts and fighting for the values they believe in. She is a newer, aggressive progressive who is willing to fight. Taken at her word, Harris is exactly what America needs. But her deeds make it hard. Those who are reluctant to offer their support after examining her record also have a point. Her past is not prologue, because it is not even her past. Even if she has grown or changed, we have seen the wolf unzip his sheepskin cloak and devour the lambs too many times.»

In Venezuela, White Supremacy Is a Key Driver of the Coup
by Greg Palast (Truthout). «This year’s so-called popular uprising is, at its heart, a furious backlash of the whiter (and wealthier) Venezuelans against their replacement by the larger Mestizo (mixed-race) poor. (Forty-four percent of the population that answered the 2014 census listed themselves as “white.”)»

The Decisions We Don't Realize We're Making: On Chugga Chugga Choo-Choos and White Nationalism
by Ferrett Steinmetz (Ferrett). «The fascinating thing about all of this is that we are awash in firm opinions we didn’t actually realize we had, because nobody challenges them seriously. We’re continually ping-ponged back and forth by ideas that we didn’t generate, and weirdly, we didn’t even realize we’d internalized – they’re just there, so deeply ingrained that we don’t even bother to argue with those ideas, and recoil from anyone who presents an opposing opinion.»

Purim, Sharpeville, and First Things

Sharpeville Massacre, South Africa, 21 March 1960

March 21st marked Purim this year, the day when Jews the world over celebrate their deliverance from the hand of Haman, who "rose up against them and sought to destroy, to slay, and to exterminate all the Jews, young and old, infants and women, on the same day, on the thirteenth of the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, and to plunder their possessions;" but the Lord "didst nullify his counsel and frustrate his intention, and caused his design to return upon his own head, and they hanged him and his sons on the gallows."

It was also the 59th anniversary of the Sharpeville Massacre in South Africa, which was the atrocity that pushed the Apartheid regime's cruel brutality onto the world stage, beginning a process that would lead to the liberation of millions three decades later, but only after an immeasurable amount of violence, torture, and oppression had been dealt out by that country's white supremacist government. In South Africa, it is called Human Rights Day.

Thus, on the confluence of two important liberation-centered holidays, it is somewhat perplexing that First Things, a publication that claims to be "the leading intellectual journal of its kind in the United States," decided to go down the Blood & Soil road in a manifesto styled "Against the Dead Consensus." As my friend Jeremiah Bailey observed, "First Things' metamorphosis into Breitbart-for-Catholics-that-went-to-College is finally complete."

Indeed, one might have seen this motion toward the alt-right in the offing back in February, 2018 when First Things published "Non Possumus" – a full-blown defense of the Vatican's 19th Century kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara, a Jewish boy, to be raised and educated in the Catholic faith on the pretext that he had been secretly baptized by his nanny as an infant – followed by editor Rusty Reno's non-apology defending his publication of the subject in order have a more expansive dialogue about "things of the Lord" that "ennoble us" but "but often only after an agonizing process of conformity to his purposes, which are not our own."

And a deeper look will also show First Things' further propensity for publishing (at least) racially tone-deaf articles like this and this.

First Things, a project belonging initially to Richard John Neuhaus and his colleagues, was founded to "confront the ideology of secularism." It has been around since 1989, and, along with the Acton Institute, has been a stalwart of the libertarianish-conservative culture-war Catholicism so ably represented by Robert Novak, George Weigel, Thomas Woods, Robert Sirico, and Neuhaus himself, among others.

Times have changed though, as the authors of this piece observe, and "There is no returning to the pre-Trump conservative consensus that collapsed in 2016. Any attempt to revive the failed conservative consensus that preceded Trump would be misguided and harmful to the right." Their answer to this conundrum? That's the troubling thing.  They propose, in essence, a cultivated Catholic identity politics; a kinder, gentler, and certainly more urbane, white nationalist authoritarianism than currently rolls out of the White House.

Or as Lillian Vogl so aptly put it, "Dammit, Donald Trump makes the patriarchy and nationalism so ugly, crude, and obvious! How can we reframe to make it look refined and principled again?"

Others have done a fine job of responding to the First Things document. Lillian's fine point-by-point response is included below. All I have is lamentation that, with a rich tradition of justice and liberation to draw from, these 13 men and one woman have chosen the path of a religious-integralist America-First ethnonationalism, a path that leads somewhere that, I assure you, we don't want to go.


Wisdom from another of my friends:

This is serious. 

Taking a stand for "the worker" (meaning, the worker of our nation / ethnicity only), in the interests of overt nationalism, combined with opposition to globalism / foreigners is exactly the core ideology of national socialism. 

It is intended to suborn the resentment of the working classes and direct it against the "other." 

It is not Christian, but it is a menace that has seduced Christians before, due to their obsession with "the west." 

Read this and see what's happening. If it looks innocuous or even pleasing, well, that's how this stuff always starts.

Of course, not everyone is unhappy about this. Zebulon Baccelli, of the American Solidarity Party's National Committee, had this to say:

About time! Everyone who feels this way should come to the American Solidarity Party and help us form a new political identity for Americans.

I can't argue with him. If this article reflects your political views, the integralist alt-right-lite element that makes up the ASP is just the crowd you should run with.

A Response by Lillian Vogl to "Against the Dead Consensus"

We oppose the soulless society of individual affluence.

[Cool, I do too. So we’re dismantling unbridled capitalism together, right?]

Our society must not prioritize the needs of the childless, the healthy, and the intellectually competitive. Our policy must accommodate the messy demands of authentic human attachments: family, faith, and the political community.

[Okay, not focusing on the problems of capitalism then... Human attachments are good. What does “accommodate messy demands” mean, though? What if the “demands” are freedom to abuse others in the name of familial, religious, or community “principles”? And who is usually left “accommodating” the needs of the children, elderly, disabled, and other “unproductive” people, with no pay?]

We welcome allies who oppose dehumanizing attempts at “liberation” such as pornography, “designer babies,” wombs for rent, and the severing of the link between sex and gender. 

[Which of these things is not like the other? 🎶]

We stand with the American citizen.

In recent years, some have argued for immigration by saying that working-class Americans are less hard-working, less fertile, in some sense less worthy than potential immigrants. We oppose attempts to displace American citizens.

[Hmm, where have I heard the mantra “X will not displace us” before???]

Advancing the common good requires standing with, rather than abandoning, our countrymen. They are our fellow citizens, not interchangeable economic units. And as Americans we owe each other a distinct allegiance and must put each other first. 

[So we’re going with blatant nationalism in item number 2. Got it. I don’t blame anyone who stops reading here. I have a strong stomach and will keep going for the sake of opposition research.]

We reject attempts to compromise on human dignity.

In 2013, the Republican National Committee released an “autopsy report” that proposed compromising on social issues in order to appeal to young voters. In fact, millennials are the most pro-life generation in America, while economic libertarianism isn’t nearly as popular as its Beltway proponents imagine. We affirm the nonnegotiable dignity of every unborn life and oppose the transhumanist project of radical self-identification.

[So “human dignity” = the right to be born. But after that, you are who the dominant forces in society say you should be. How dare anyone “self identify” their place in the Order?!?]

We resist a tyrannical liberalism.

[“Tyrannical liberalism” is as oxymoronic as “dark brightness.” George Orwell gives you a Nancy Pelosi clap for this subheader.]

We seek to revive the virtues of liberality and neighborliness that many people describe as “liberalism.” But we oppose any attempt to conflate American interests with liberal ideology. When an ideological liberalism seeks to dictate our foreign policy and dominate our religious and charitable institutions, tyranny is the result, at home and abroad. 

[Didn’t even try to explain what this could possibly mean, just asserted the specter of tyranny. No more claps for you. Oh wait, your fragile white male self thinks THAT is what “Nazi” means: Someone not giving you what you think you’re specially entitled to.]

We want a country that works for workers.

The Republican Party has for too long held investors and “job creators” above workers and citizens, dismissing vast swaths of Americans as takers unworthy of its time. Trump’s victory, driven in part by his appeal to working-class voters, shows the potential of a political movement that heeds the cries of the working class as much as the demands of capital. Americans take more pride in their identity as workers than their identity as consumers. Economic and welfare policy should prioritize work over consumption. 

[On second thought, you get another Nancy Pelosi clap for this. This paragraph is absolutely correct. Would it kill you, though, to add one sentence saying “therefore, we should repeal the 2017 Trump/Ryan tax cuts that gave 20-40% tax cuts to business owners and exempted all but the top 1/10th of 1% of families from the generational wealth transfer tax”?]

We believe home matters.

[Is this about keeping women in their place? That seems to be where the headline is going. But wait! There’s more...]

For those who enjoy the upsides, a borderless world brings intoxicating new liberties. They can go anywhere, work anywhere. They can call themselves “citizens” of the world. But the jet-setters’ vision clashes with the human need for a common life. And it has bred resentments that are only beginning to surface. We embrace the new nationalism insofar as it stands against the utopian ideal of a borderless world that, in practice, leads to universal tyranny.

[What actually is this about? Are you seriously suggesting not allowing people freedom of movement? We’re embracing “new nationalism” and the opposite is “universal tyranny”? George Orwell’s corpse is seriously swelling to many times its original size with...something.]

Whatever else might be said about it, the Trump phenomenon has opened up space in which to pose these questions anew. We will guard that space jealously. And we respectfully decline to join with those who would resurrect warmed-over Reaganism and foreclose honest debate. 

[We thought Reagan was our friend, but his policies let women and minorities get ideas about their equality. No more! Trump has given us permission to not be “politically correct” anymore, so we can intimidate women and minorities again with impunity. We’re just asking questions! How dare anyone read sexism or racism into this list!?! That’s not “honest debate” because you can’t prove we have discriminatory intent in our hearts. No more libertarianism being categorized as an ally of the right. We’re ready to go full-on authoritarian, while calling the opposition to authoritarianism “tyranny” without batting an eye.]

Items of Interest: Second Week of Lent

Fragile, Handle With Care: On White Classicists
by Mathura Umachandran (Eidolon). «Classicists are very well placed (I wrote “uniquely” at first, but I don’t want to displace exceptionalism only to re-inscribe it elsewhere) to critique the political realities of racial injustice. That is, classicists are at a fruitful vantage point to expose how the foundational privileges of whiteness have been used to justify imperial systems of control, racial hierarchies and oppressive aesthetic regimes. And yet, the assumption of the cultural superiority of the Greco Roman past as the fountainhead of white Europe is an attitude that is so much a commonplace in our discipline that it hardly goes remarked upon.»

Moral church, amoral society
by Robin Lovin (The Christian Century). «The situation of the Confessing Church, however, is not quite our situation. Bonhoeffer was trying to sustain his church in a place where the state and the political party sought to determine all of the legitimate social options. The 20th century has offered numerous examples of that sort of state, and in many of them, “taking up space” has required real courage and brought real persecution on those who attempted it. It is less clear what it means to take up space that is morally empty.»

Beyond the Wages of Whiteness: Du Bois on the Irrationality of Antiblack Racism
by Ella Myers (Social Science Research Council). «Ella Myers provides an account of W. E. B. Du Bois’s nuanced analysis of the sense of entitlement among whites in the United States. Drawing from Du Bois’s Black Reconstruction and other writings, Myers draws attention to both the concept of a compensatory “wage” that elevates the social status of lower class whites in ways that bind them to white capital, but also to the irrational aspects of antiblack racism. Myers’s essay complements the earlier “Reading Racial Conflict” essay by J. Phillip Thompson on Black Reconstruction, and also makes a direct connection to debates on the role of the white working class in Trump’s electoral victory.»

75 Percent of Republicans Say White Americans Are Discriminated Against
by Peter Wade (Rolling Stone) This surge of white identity politics, not some abstract 'both sides' polarization, is at the root of the current conflict.

White Nationalism’s Deep American Roots
by Adam Serwer (The Atlantic). «King’s recent question, posed in a New York Times interview, may be appalling: “White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization—how did that language become offensive?” But it is apt. “That language” has an American past in need of excavation. Without such an effort, we may fail to appreciate the tenacity of the dogma it expresses, and the difficulty of eradicating it. The president’s rhetoric about “shithole countries” and “invasion” by immigrants invites dismissal as crude talk, but behind it lie ideas whose power should not be underestimated.»

Privilege Masked as Orthodoxy: What the Slander of Cardinal Ticona Reveals
by Jerry Ryan (Commonweal). «But what we are witnessing in many traditionalist groups of the kind that have targeted Ticona is on a different level altogether. Here Catholic identity is being defined as adherence to a rigid and unforgiving moral code and to a formalistic liturgical rite. This is combined with a total disregard and even disdain for social justice and the teachings of Vatican II. The image of a triumphant and glorious church is part of our creed and the object of our hope, but it is not our present reality, and to pretend otherwise is a dangerous form of self-deception. The Kingdom of Christ is not of this world; we are not yet a cortege of white-robed innocents following the Lamb wherever He goes. We are members of a pilgrim church, a community of broken people seeking mercy—and a communion of saints only to the degree that this mercy is received. Beneath all the triumphalism of the traditionalists can be heard the blasphemous prayer of the Pharisee: “I give you thanks, O Lord, that I am not like the rest of men.»