Rev. Dr. David Rice

So this happened to me this week. Specifically the response to this thread. Pretty wild.

Wow

✅ If the wealthy and powerful justify their actions by claiming the name of Jesus, they are probably being blasphemous
✅ Have fun blowing things up, especially ideologies that distort historical Christian faith & practice (metaphorically speaking)
✅ BBQ is LIFE

Happy 4th of July

Remember, this 4th of July holiday weekend:

✅ Jesus refuses to be your mascot, unless you are on the side of the vulnerable and left out
✅ You can be patriotic without embracing Christian Nationalism

Twenty Lessons, read by John Lithgow Key selections from On Tyranny, for viewing and sharing

"On Tyranny" is a #1 NYT bestseller again. I wish the moment were different. But I’m glad the book is useful. And grateful for all the kind words about putting the 20 lessons to work.
snyder.substack.com/p/twenty-les...

This is not the Way of Jesus.

Pastors must point people through Word and deed to Jesus and the now-but-not-yet Kingdom of God. This is the Way. 3/3

Far-right Christian nationalistic ideology serves a god other than Jesus. It serves mammon tangled with power by any means, which is why it will lie, cheat, steal, and corrupt to gain political power. 2/

Pastors and church leaders play a critical role in helping folks untangle faithful Christianity & political theology from far-right extremist ideology. 1/

They want authoritarianism. They want to impose the will of the minority on the majority

It starts with cultivating fear.

It’s important to be a discerning about this right now.

He’s trying to do what the far-right has done in the US for decades: create an alternative reality based on lies that says Christians are being persecuted here, and then offer the solution to this problem - far-right political actors who could care less about faithful Christianity..

Vance is attempting to lay the groundwork to change that, hoping conservative Christians in the UK will support Nigel Farage and his party.

Surprisingly, the Church of England isn’t nearly as polarized along ideological lines as the church in the US. Some of this is the polity of the Church of England. It’s a big-tent-type of church that includes people from all sorts of perspectives.

Vance is attempting to bolster the standing of the far-right in the UK by using the same tactics that the far-right in the US has used to activate conservative Christians in this country.

Here’s why Vance is making claims about religious discrimination in the UK:

The far-right is the UK has very little political power. Minuscule compared to the far-right in Germany, France, and the US.

It’s like a meat eater complaining at a burger joint that bc the fries don’t come with meat on them they are being persecuted for being a meat eater.

Foolish.

The victim mentality of US Christians who *believe* they are persecuted is silly. These are mostly far-right ideologues whose ideas are unpopular. They have confused unpopularity w/ persecution.

Christians are not persecuted in the US. The mentality that they are is insulting to Christian around the world who are actually persecuted.

Being a pastor, and speaking the truth to powerful people in ways that afflict their power and comfort means those same people will demand an apology from you for making them feel uncomfortable.

They can take that up with the Spirit, I suppose.

When one is living in a distorted reality of one’s own making, when another speaks the truth firmly but with kindness, it feels like an attack. Evil feels attacked by the truth.

This comment is about Bishop Mariann Edgar Budde inviting Trump to have mercy on the fearful and vulnerable among us.

How to tell if a movement is authoritarian (a hunch)?

The movement doesn’t produce any creative artistic expression. They simply regurgitate relics of the past.

In contrast, movements of freedom & liberty provoke artistic expression and creativity. New artifacts accompany & spur on the movement.

Watching The Music Man, which is about a conman who swindles ordinary people out of their $$ & community trust by stoking fear, distracting them with song and dance, and using his charm and fast talk tactics to keep the authorities at bay.

Definitely no parallels to modern US society 😳

A quote from Letters and Papers from Prison Marriage is more than your love for each other. It has a higher dignity and power, for it is God's holy ordinance, through which He wills to perpetuate t...

He was engaged a few months before he was arrested in 1943, but was never allowed to marry his fiancé. His “Letters and Papers from Prison” include some reflections on marriage 👇
www.goodreads.com/quotes/71498...

Bonhoeffer is a popular theologian to reference for various reasons, but at a wedding feels a little out of place. What was the vicar saying about Bonhoeffer?

I’m very pleased to find you here 🙏🏼

Out of roughly 153 million votes cast in this election, the presidency was decided by 230k across the three states of Wisconsin (30k), Michigan (80k) and Pennsylvania (120k). That's 00.15%.

This remains an extremely closely divided nation. Any agenda viewed as extreme is likely to face backlash.

That’s my instinct too, but @bjconthehill.bsky.social hosted the Shurden Lectures last week at Mercer University with Dr. John Compton. His research on secularism and democracy shows the opposite. I’ll share links when our articles go live.

Christian nationalism, when you get past the bluster, is never about fidelity to Christ and the coming Kingdom.

It’s about power and control.

I wrote a dissertation on this, about pastoral resiliency and spiritual formation.

In short, one’s desire must be bent toward fidelity to God’s kingdom rather than cultural influence and power.

One must be willing to “lose” in the short term in order to gain so much in the long term.

I think a lot about what it takes for pastors to resist the worst cultural impulses, especially when many churches and church-goers go along with them.

What does a faithful and resilient Christianity look like?

Pastors who resisted fascism in 1930s Germany are the ones we study and learn from today.

We don't read or learn from the pastors who went along with the Nazi takeover of German society and the German church.

We read the ones who resisted.

We learn from the courageous ones.