I recently led a few workshops on how to follow Jesus in election season. After opening each session by reading a few “objective” words we are barraged by in election season, I asked each person to pay attention to what emotions or feelings came up as they listened.
Republican. Democrat. 2020 election. Donald Trump. Super Tuesday. Joe Biden.
100% of the people said they felt things like: anxiety, fear, anger, frustration, uncertainty, etc.
Not a single response was connected to a feeling of HOPE.
It was sobering to see what each of us is carrying in this polarized and difficult time in our country. We are collectively limping into our workplaces, churches, and family gatherings.
Some of us are so caught up in partisan politics that we are breaking relationships. Others of us are so overwhelmed that it’s led to paralysis. As challenging as it can be to navigate the polarization of a Presidential election, neither hyper-partisanship or passive withdrawal is an option.
I’ll never forget watching the United States military invade Iraq during the Gulf War. I was a young Christian kid who took a break from playing video games at my friends house to watch the largest military super power in human history drop bombs on an “enemy” I had never met. I had no reason to question the actions of our military – let alone consider the human cost of those on its receiving end – because I understood the mission of the United States as synonymous with the mission of God.
And I was just one in a vast sea of evangelical Christians who held this kind of worldview built upon American exceptionalism. It’s a worldview that is still far too prevalent and compromises our fidelity to the kingdom of God.
I spent my early 20’s interrogating and unlearning this version of USAmerican Christianity. Like many, I reacted by withdrawing from civic engagement completely and embraced a “we don’t talk about politics, just Jesus” kind of faith. A few years later in seminary, I was drawn to those in our Christian story who lived a prophetic alternative on the outskirts of the empire. The Essenes. The Desert Mothers and Fathers. The Radical Reformers. These were remarkable Jesus people who trusted that the prophetic potency of their lives could change the broken systems and structures of the empire from the outside.
It felt like I had found a home in this apolitical camp that made so much sense in the insulated halls of academia.
But then, I came into direct contact with the people being impacted by our broken systems. That changed everything.
My undocumented friend told me: “I can’t vote, so I need you to. My life depends on it.”
My Christian Palestinian friend said: “Why do your people think I’m a terrorist?”
My neighbor was deported and separated from her five kids. As we sat with her weeping on the streets of Tijuana, it was insufficient for us to say, “We will pray for you” and drive back home with our blue passports. We must pray for her AND we must commit our lives to changing the broken systems that separated her family and kept her children from a future of flourishing.
In many ways, I still resonate with what I studied in seminary, but in the classroom of real life relationships with those on the underside of power, it fell short.
Remaining apolitical was insufficient, insular and privileged.
How do we love our “enemies” if we don’t leverage our influence as US citizens when it is dropping bombs on family weddings and feeding its addiction to an economy of violence? How do we love our neighbors on the underside of power if we aren’t willing to confront the systems and structures that have them in shackles? How do we pursue “liberty and justice for all” when success is defined by dominating those who threaten us?
The answer to these questions is clear: our allegiance is pledged only to the Kingdom of God and the Jesus who embodies it. But that is not an excuse for apolitical withdrawal from the democratic process of the United States. Although citizens of the Kingdom, we must also leverage our influence as United States citizens on behalf of those on the underside of power and, as a democracy, we (thankfully!) have that option.
So if Christians refuse to fan the partisan flames or to withdraw from politics altogether, what is left for us?
I propose a third way; an embrace of a Conflicted Allegiance.
A conflicted allegiance liberates us to unapologetically live out the values of the kingdom of God while continually discerning our constructive engagement with, support of, and participation in the United States.
A conflicted allegiance reminds us that the Church is meant to be the soul, not the surrogate of the State.
It means we stand with and care for the people fleeing violence on our border AND we leverage our influence in the United States to help fix the broken systems that are keeping them from finding refuge.
It means we look our neighbors on the streets in the eye to honor their humanity AND we stand in city council meetings advocating for systems to support their healing.
It means we stand in solidarity with our friends of color AND we vote for policy that upends institutionalized racism.
It means we navigate the mental illness of our traumatized veterans AND ensure there are medical and social services readily accessible to them.
It means we plead with God for the healing of our friends caught in a cycle of drug addiction AND leverage our influence to hold those accountable who have been irresponsible in their distribution of prescription drugs.
It means we live out our deep convictions AND refuse to be a jerk in the process.
This stuff isn’t easy, but it’s the necessary way to find and follow Jesus in the midst of living in a context so partisan and polarized. May we prioritize the “least of these” with our vote on November 3rd and with our lives November 4th and everyday beyond it.
This Election Season, I will celebrate and live a Conflicted Allegiance.