“In the Example of Bonhoeffer and ‘Costly Discipleship'”

Oh how much American Evangelical Christians need to learn from the life and social and political activism of Pastor and Political Theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer who, in the first half of the twentieth-century, stood up against Hitler’s political correctness and Germany’s racial violence and ethnic cleansing against the Jews!

Bonhoeffer was not afraid to denounce the  social evils and the destructive racial ideologies of the Hitler regime and totalitarianism. He was not afraid to declare in public and through his political  sermons the dignity of all people, even the Jews!

Sadly, there were powerful and influential  German Christians and theologians who were Hitler’s allies and who helped him carry out his plan to annihilate the  Jews.

In the same line of thought, sadly, contemporary American evangelicalism has fostered  certain destructive ideologies that are detrimental to the promise of American democracy, equality,  freedom, and pluralism; they’re also detrimental to true Christianity  and  the imperative of Christian love, tolerance,  racial harmony, and “sacrificial discipleship.”

Who among today’s American Evangelicals will speak against Trump’s racist and anti-immigrant rhetoric?

Who among today’s American Evangelicals will speak against Hilary Clinton’s crime against Blacks in America and her exploitation of the Haitian underclass and masses?

Who among today’s American Evangelicals will speak against Ted Cruz’s anti-poor, anti-immigrant, and anti-democracy discourse?

Who among today’s American Evangelicals will speak against Police brutality and racial profiling against Blacks and minority groups?

True Christianity rejects any type of human oppression, exploitation, and violence, and condemns human structures and actions that desecrate life and dehumanize individuals.  Genuine discipleship promotes a life of compassion, sacrificial love, justice, selflessness, human solidarity, and what Bonhoeffer famously called “costly discipleship.”