Shock and Awe: One Week After the Election, The Convocation Unscripted+LIVE Webinar [S1E16]
PLUS, Last call! Join Diana, Robby, Kristin, and Jemar tonight (11/17) in Atlanta for a live conversation about the election and our nation's future.
Dear Convocation Unscripted community,
Greetings from Atlanta—where the Convocation Unscripted team is preparing for our third Faith & Democracy Tour event tonight, starting at 5pm ET at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. Details are below. We hope to see some of you there, and please help us spread the word today to any Atlanta friends.
And thanks to the nearly 500 of you who joined us for our Convocation Unscripted+LIVE webinar Thursday night. We’re sharing the recording of that vibrant session, which included such insightful questions, below as well.
In solidarity,
Robby, Diana, Kristin, and Jemar
Shock and Awe: One Week After the Election
In the first week out from his surprising sweep of every swing state and electoral victory, Donald Trump has embarked on a “shock and awe” strategy of overwhelming the media with rapid-fire announcements of administration and cabinet nominations. By picking extreme, unqualified, and controversial nominees, and by preemptively asking the Senate to forego its Constitutional duty to provide "advice and consent,” Trump is setting up the first loyalty test for Republican senators. We talk about how this clown car of nominees expresses contempt for the basic idea of competency and the task of governance, but accomplishes one clear end: embedding sycophantic Trump loyalists who have no regard for the missions of the institutions with which they are entrusted across every branch of the federal government.
In the wake of what’s coming, we’ll need to look for models of faithful resistance. While many white Christians have understandably recently been invoking the example of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, as Jemar reminds us, there is a Spirit of Justice that has animated the Black Christian tradition that is much closer to home.
11/17 (Atlanta): Our Faith & Democracy Tour is Coming to St. Luke’s Episcopal Church
NEW FAITH AND DEMOCRACY TOUR STOP—After doing two October stops at First Baptist Church in Greensboro, NC, and Dayspring United Methodist Church in Tempe, AZ, we’re thrilled to be coming to St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in Atlanta, GA, on Sunday, 11/17, at 5 pm ET. If you’re within striking distance of Atlanta, we’d love for you to join us.
The event is FREE (and the first 160 people in the door get a free book), but registration is required to ensure a seat. Click the button below to register.
Co-hosts of The Convocation Unscripted: Diana Butler Bass, Kristin Du Mez, Robert P. Jones, and Jemar Tisby, PhD, will be joined by an amazing set of musical artists: Ruby Amanfu, Sam Ashworth, Taylor Leonhardt, andTommy Sims.
Also, bookmark our Faith & Democracy Tour home page — we hope to be adding more tour stops soon! And we hope to see you on the road! And please help us spread the word to anyone you know in the Atlanta area.
Elections have a profound impact on people's lives, and it's clear that many don't always consider how their choices affect their neighbors. The idea of "loving thy neighbor as thyself" can sometimes be forgotten, especially when we fail to recognize that we're all interconnected. Whether we acknowledge it or not, our actions and decisions shape the society we live in.
When we look at the administration's nominees, handpicked by Trump and his team, we must ask ourselves: do they truly care about the Constitution or the well-being of the American people? It seems they care more about their own interests and those of their supporters, many of whom resist societal change. Their focus appears to be on maintaining the status quo—preserving an order that favors certain groups, particularly white Americans, and especially white men. Too many Republicans will fall in line and approve these appointments, abandoning the values that once defined America.
If politicians claim to be Christian, then their decisions should be guided by spiritual values rather than by greed, lobbyists, or party loyalty. Policies should reflect the needs of the voters, not the interests of those in power. Faith and politics shouldn't be separate; as a Christian, your faith should inform your actions, how you treat others, and how you lead. Integrity, compassion, and a commitment to justice should drive decisions, not political expediency.
I have been saying what Kristin said for a while now--that the detention centers will sooner or later be used to detain more than immigrants marked for deportation.|
And the deportations themselves are not going to be limited to the undocumented, even if it were justified to deport all of them. They have told us so. Even the numbers they declare they want to deport--25 million the last time I heard them name a number--is about twice the estimated number of undocumented immigrants. JD Vance wants to deport those under protected status because he doesn't like the law that grants them that status, even though it has been on the books more than 30 years. Plus Stephen Miller has declared his intention to strip citizenship from immigrants who have earned it. He calls it "de-naturalization."
So many Trump supporters are in denial of what he said he would do, and even some I know who didn't vote for Trump are in denial that things could get as bad as some are saying. I guess they need to read Timothy Snyder.