Searching for a New America
America is sweltering today with as much racism as it was during its years of legal slavery. It continues to suffer from what Jim Wallis (President/ Editor in Chief of Sojourners Magazine of Faith in Action for Social Justice) called “America’s Original Sin.”
Donald J. Trump proclaims as President of the United States of America, he’s “Going to make America great again.” In essence, his goal is to maintain and/or reinstate the ways of the old America. It is the old America that could look beyond the commonality that exists between all people and deny the humanity of people of color to feed its insatiable appetite for greed, white superiority and economical power. As a matter of fact, it is the struggle for economic power that has so corrupted the old America.
In the old America, the power hungry white man played upon the ignorance and poverty of his own people in order to maintain racism and feed his power hungry appetite. He had no more respect for the poor white than he had for people of color; yet, he found it beneficial to teach the poor whites to hate and think themselves superior to people of color. It is that hate and ignorance that Trump plays upon today.
The old America is where even the white man’s religion has been corrupted and forced to turn a blind eye to the evils of racism. Typical of this corruption can be seen today as the so called “conservative evangelicals” walk hand in hand with the divisive rhetoric and implementation of the oppressive policies of Trump. How can law abiding Christians who supported family values now follow an amoral leader? It is hypocrisy of the highest nature and cuts against the grain of Jesus’ command to love one another as he has loved us.
It is the old America that Trump is attempting to keep alive, the one where the white man maintained majority rule and dominance. It is the fear of losing that dominance and majority rule that Trump has used to energize and dupe his base into following his narcissistic and evil ways.
It is the new America that we must pursue, for the old America will not survive its corrupt and sinful nature of racism. God is speaking to the old America today from Isaiah 43:19 and saying, “Behold I want to do a new thing, now it shall spring forth; shall ye not know it? I will make a way in the wilderness and rivers in the desert.”
We should be in search of that “New America,” one where our white sisters and brothers are no longer willing to participate in any egregious behavior against people of color. A new America where all believers live and follow the God with whom the Bible says, “have no respecter of person.” We all should live and search for the New America where love will triumph over the racist ways of old America. That new America where God says, “Behold I will do a new thing.” A new America where neither ideology nor politics will support the oppressive nature of the old.