An uneasiness about America

I have been unsettled about this whole election. Part of it has to do that I wasn't thrilled with either candidate. I realized on election night that if I had to choose a president based on what was best for America that I could have made a choice. But trying to choose a candidate that was best for the Kingdom of God seemed impossible. I think I'm disillusioned with what America is coming to stand for. Brennan Manning seemed to echo my thoughts when he wrote -

"A critique of our culture in the light of the gospel is imperative if the church of Jesus Christ is to preserve a coherent sense of itself in a world that is torn and tearing. To criticize the system of Western technological capitalism is neither unpatriotic nor un-American, for as Walter Wink, professor of biblical interpretation at Auburn Theological Seminary in New York City, noted, "We cannot minister to the soul of America unless we love its soul." A chastened patriotism is indispensable for the survival of the nation as well as of the church. National attitudes and policies change only because people love their country.

I see three areas where the American Dream is counter-evangelical - that is, in direct opposition to the message of Jesus and a life endorsed with the signature of Jesus. Our culture, as John Kavanaugh observed, 'fosters and sustains a functional trinitarian god of consumerism, hedonism, and nationalism. Made in the image and likeness of such a god, we are committed to lives of possessiveness, pleasure, and domination.'

Unless the church of the Lord Jesus creates a counter-current to the drift of materialism, self-indulgence, and nationalism, Christians will merely adapt to the secular environment in a tragic distortion of the gospel, in which the words of Jesus are reinterpreted to mean anything, everything, and nothing." (Read more)

I want to be a good American. I love my country. I love what it has given to me throughout the years. But I am troubled that it is building a foundation on sand. The preservation of what we have has taken precedence over the call of Jesus. And I can't settle for less that what Jesus wants. If that is what it means to be American then I am not interested.