Last updated on January 3, 2021
One of many things lacking in contemporary American politics and culture is an appreciation of nuance; that is, the subtle distinctions in meaning and importance that can make all the difference in how we understand circumstances and events. We also lack a tolerance for ambiguity and relativity.
To be sure, I’m not a relativist and I believe some things are quite clear; even absolute, in a sense. (This will be more evident later.) But many things are just not as simple as many of my students and those on social media want them to be. I often tell my students that if I have an agenda at all, in my classes, it’s not a partisan one. I want, instead, to instill in them a suspicion of easy answers.
This semester, for example, I’m teaching a course on environmental politics and law. Oftentimes, commentary on environmental politics proceeds as if many assumptions about scientific knowledge, values, and solutions are self-evident. But nearly every aspect of each environmental diagnosis and prescription is subject to dispute. Plus, there’s so much we don’t know and, if the history of environmental, energy, and agricultural policy is any indication, we often solve one problem while creating another. This doesn’t mean that we ignore environmental problems, but we recognize tradeoffs and adjust to complexity with a willingness to deliberate and be flexible. Humility, above all, should animate our policy-making and politics. None of us know it all and none of us have all the answers. We will get it right sometimes and get it wrong sometimes. That’s life.
But one area where I wish more people had an appreciation of this nuance and complexity is in the area of patriotism and, in its opposite, which I’ll simply call anti-Americanism. I’ll start with the latter.
Many of my students, colleagues, and plenty of people in the media and popular culture seem to believe there is some virtue in hating one’s country. America, we are told, is fundamentally and thoroughly racist, misogynist, imperialist, unjust, unequal, corrupt, fake, and just plain evil. Also, we’re fat, loud, obnoxious, self-centered, non-compliant, unreasonable, materialistic, unintelligent, uninformed, etc. All of these adjectives and more have appeared in one way or another in my students’ essays and comments, in conversations with other faculty members at multiple institutions, and especially on social media and in mass media platforms that conservatives love to hate. And let’s be clear, there are empirical examples to back up all these accusations: one need only note my waist size!
American history is indeed full of scars. From the evils of slavery, Jim Crow Laws, the internment of Japanese Americans in WWII, and the veritable genocide against Native Americans to unnecessarily repressive policies and imperialistic tendencies from Jefferson, to Polk, to Teddy Roosevelt and many neoconservatives; there are plenty of reasons for shame and repentance. We could also include the dropping of the atomic bombs, the atrocities of the Civil War and in Vietnam, and the evils of eugenics upheld in cases like Buck v. Bell or of the racism institutionalized in Dredd Scott and Plessy v. Ferguson.
To treat America and American history as a kind of fairy tale of genius and justice is an act of willful ignorance and a rejection of the responsibility and accountability we all face in righting wrongs and being certain they never happen again. This is, in part, why I reject the notion of “American Exceptionalism” as deeply problematic and even dangerous. More on that some other time.
Without an appreciation for nuance, ambiguity, and complexity though, these scars are all that some people might see. So they rip down statues and try to write pseudo histories like the New York Times’ appalling “1619 Project,” or virtually any account written by the pseudo-historian Howard Zinn. A contempt for history, and a deliberate attempt to distort it, is unhealthy for a republic and only breeds distrust, ignorance, division, and an identity crisis.
The same is as true for those who paint American history as a utopia as it is for those who paint it as a racist hellscape. Whether you obsessively loathe or worship a nation, you’re still an ideologue.
So the response to Americans’ self-hatred ought not to be a kind of reactive nationalism that acts as if “It’s right because America did it” or “My country, right or wrong.” It ought to be, “I love my country enough to celebrate its high points and to call it out when it loses its way.” The cliche that you don’t know or love someone until you know and love them in spite of their flaws arguably applies to countries as well as to people.
Instead, many Americans take the intellectually lazy way out. It’s either, “My country is dang-near perfect so either love it or leave it,” or it’s, “My country sucks (by the way, look virtuous and courageous I am for saying this, and no I couldn’t possibly be part of the problem).”
Why are so many people seemingly afraid of the middle ground? Maybe fear isn’t the obstacle. Maybe it’s lack of imagination.
On a related note, as I grow older, I am increasingly uncomfortable with the almost religious patriotism of the baby-boomer generation and their children. The same is true with the “Religious Right.” It’s as if love of America were a biblically mandated disposition and that criticism of American foreign policy, especially, were a kind of heresy. I don’t like, for example, when evangelicals use church services like patriotic pep rallies or when someone like Trump holds up a Bible he’s never read, using it as a prop to fabricate a picture of himself as a kind of holy martyr against the rioting masses. The Church, the service/mass, and God’s Word are about Christ – not America or any other nation. Full stop.
The persistent and problematic politicization of Christianity has pushed my generation (“millennials”) and the generation of my students away from the Church. They equate “Christian” with “Republican,” and think of the faith more as a partisan movement. This is exactly what the Republian party, both in the days of Reagan and George W. Bush, aimed to do. They co-opted American evangelical leaders and transformed entire denominations into an electoral powerhouse. In the process, these Churches put fidelity to party platforms and candidates in place of faithfulness to Scripture and Christ.
But notice how that critique bothers some of you. Why is that? Yes,there are exceptions and I’m painting in broad strokes. American evangelicalism is not monolithic. But consider how someone might respond saying:
“Yeah, but, Josh, the Republicans are against abortion and appoint justices favorable to religious liberty. Are you suggesting we abandon that?”
Well, first of all, I think your confidence in the GOP’s commitment to anti-abortion and pro religious liberty policy and personnel may be a kind of “Hollow Hope.” Second, I’m not telling you how to vote. Third, just because I’m frustrated with the GOP and a politicized religious right is not a simultaneous endorsement of the Democrats and the religious left. You could measure the ideological and political distance between me and the current Democratic Party in light-years.
But thinking of the culture war, of America’s virtues and vices, and of our religious commitments purely in political categories belies a deeper problem that many on the left and right share. That is, they politicize everything. Every dang thing becomes a partisan signal. We fear saying or doing anything because everything we say and do ends up being interpreted as a statement of who or what we’re for and against politically. We just keep digging trenches, building walls, and perpetuating “digital inquisitions” through Twitter mobs and the totalitarian cancel culture. No nuance. No forgiveness. No listening. And we find very little common ground, if any.
This is not an environment that breeds toleration, individuality, unity, community, intelligent conversations, or trust. This politicization of everything and the inability to imagine a middle ground between hating and loving one’s country – between hating and loving the other party – is a cancer on the American Republic. Furthermore, when we attach to partisan policy positions a significance similar to religious doctrines we end up holding and defending those political opinions as if they were the product of divine revelation. We have failed to follow Jesus’ teaching to distinguish between the “things of God and the things of Caesar.” In the process, we’ve forgotten God and have given Caesar far too much power.
On the political side, we need more nuance, and more willingness to acknowledge the lack of easy answers. We also need to stop looking to elections and policy to fix our crises of leadership and government without acknowledging the underlying spiritual and cultural rot at the core of everything else.
On the Christian, side, we need to recover our identity, not as a kind of partisan frisbee tossed around in the pursuit of political power. We also don’t need to abandon politics, voting, political parties, and opinions. But we must be willing to place the Kingdom of God above and before our country, our party, and our politics generally. We must be willing to speak “truth to power” as the Old Testament prophets and the Apostles did, regardless of the political or economic consequences.
But we must also resist the tendency to frame every battle in political terms, as if the true opponents of Christianity and the truth itself were flesh-and-blood, another political party, or some particular race or class.
Our enemy is the devil and the sinful nature within each of us. Ultimately, thanks to Jesus’ death and resurrection, the war has already been won. Yet Christians left and right act as if elections were the big show. Meanwhile, the devil takes advantage of our distractedness to warp our imaginations, misdirect our affections, and trivialize our religion.
It doesn’t have to be like this.
Love your country, repent of its vices and celebrate its virtues. Pray, and proactively vote and work to make it more just and faithful to God’s Will. Pray for it, learn about it, and lead by example. But also resist the politicization of everything.
Perhaps, what I’m trying to articulate is a “qualified patriotism.” I love the United States of America. I admire its Founders and cherish the Constitution. There are so many places, people, and possibilities that make this country amazing. I don’t want to live or raise my kids anywhere else in the world. But I will not allow partisan allegiances “trump” (pun intended) my responsibility to call sin a sin and to call evil, evil. Sometimes the Country is headed in the wrong direction. Sometimes both parties are at fault. Sometimes you need to stand up to your own country and say, “I love you too much to watch you do this to yourself.”
What I will not be, however, is a qualified Christian. Perhaps that term would be worth expanding on later…
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