Here’s the thing: we humans, similar to small-brained chickens, have this need to know our place in the pecking order. Most want to peck our way to the top, uncaring of the damage we do to others in the process.
Dear Thoughtful Pastor: Is White Nationalism in any way compatible with Jesus’ Commandments?
No.
I suppose I should expand on that answer.
Adherents and apologists for White Nationalism suggest that there should be a nation set aside where “whites,” however defined, hold primary privilege.
Those who fit the definition of “white” hold all the major power posts and carry special privileges accorded to those on top of the human pecking order and denied to those defined as “non-white.”
Non-whites can live and work in the nation but with fewer privileges.
Saudi Arabia could serve as a possible example. Saudis, especially Saudis from the extensive royal family (Saud), will always be in charge. However, the nation imports many thousands of laborers from other countries, primarily India and Pakistan right now. These imports do the menial and lower paying work to support the societal and racially pure leisure class.
Historical precedent for the pecking-order society
Many nations functioned historically under similar racial-supremacy arrangements. It can be a clear, efficient and effective way to sort out societal roles. The classes stay separate. The rules strongly discourage or even forbid marriage outside class lines, although procreation across the lines is standard practice.
But to go to your question: can a system like this find compatibility with what Jesus taught?
Let’s look at the words Mary, mother of Jesus, sang upon hearing the confirmation that she is to be the mother of the Savior. (Luke 1:51-55)
Among other things, she states,
He [i.e., God] has shown strength with his arm; he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts. He has brought down the powerful from their thrones, and lifted up the lowly; he has filled the hungry with good things, and sent the rich away empty. He has helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy, according to the promise he made to our ancestors, to Abraham and to his descendants forever.
Thus the “The Great Reversal.” In the kingdom of heaven, normal earthly patterns with the wealthy and powerful on top turn upside down.
Jesus lived that out. He had this thing for hanging out with the powerless, the down-and-outers. His words of critique were leveled ONLY at those who occupied the top of the societal/religious/political ladders, i.e, the racial supremacists of the day.
In one of my favorite stories, found in Luke 15, Jesus describes the kingdom of heaven in a series of stories that feature three “uncleans.”
First, we have the shepherd with the lost sheep–forever barred from the religious rituals as there was no adequate cleansing from his pollution of constant association with sheep.
Second, we have the woman with the lost coin, like all women generally deemed unclean and unfit for public power roles.
Third, we have the patriarch with the lost son. This man discarded all his dignity and station in favor of this rebellious kid who had insulted him with words of the greatest disrespect, bankrupted him and who ended up feeding pigs.
Those normally considered last in society end up being those who best portray the nature of God.
Who is my racial neighbor?
Look at how Jesus interpreted this summary of all commandments: “You shall love the Lord God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind and with all your strength and you shall love your neighbor as yourself.”
In Luke 10, a man who wants above all to inherit the kingdom of God asks Jesus for advice.
This request prompted the “The Good Samaritan” story. You want God’s blessing? Then you go out of your way to care for your greatest enemies–and other races.
Here’s the thing: we humans, similar to small-brained chickens, have this need to know our place in the pecking order. Most want to peck our way to the top, uncaring of the damage we do to others in the process.
Kingdom of heaven teaching, that which Jesus offered us, asks us to stand firm against this tendency.
However, this whole “the last shall be first” idea is possibly the toughest of all Jesus’ teachings. Nothing in our society supports it. We fight to be first, first in line, first in prestige, first in power, first in nations. And each time we must be first, we start seeing those who are last as slightly, or even more than slightly, less than human.
The moment we dehumanize the other, we have crossed over to evil.
We dehumanize when we call others “stupid” or “ignorant” or “losers” or “vermin” or “rapists and murderers” or “haters” as though one word can fully describe another. We dehumanize others when we sexual slang words for women or label the physically or mentally different as “strange.” We dehumanize when we insist in any way that someone is deficient as a human being.
So, no. No racial supremacy movement can find legitimacy in the teachings of Jesus.
[Note: a version of this column is slated to run in the Feb 10, 2017, edition of the Denton Record-Chronicle. The Thoughtful Pastor, AKA Christy Thomas, welcomes all questions for the column. Although the questioner will not be identified, I do need a name and verifiable contact information in case the newspaper editor has need of it. You may use this link to email questions.]
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