María
De Muth

escocés
McKnight

Screenshot 2023-01-13 at 1.50.18 PM

Naghmeh
panahi

Empathy for Immigrants Sounds Like Christianity 101. Here’s Why Some Say It’s A Sin.

Por Bob Smietana
immigration immigrants
Migrants line up after being detained by U.S. immigration authorities at the U.S. border wall, seen from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, Wednesday, Dec. 27, 2023. (AP Photo/Christian Chavez)

When Bishop Mariann Budde stood in the pulpit at the Washington National Cathedral at an inauguration week prayer service and asked President Donald Trump to show mercy on migrants, some believe she was expressing a biblical virtue.

“Blessed are the merciful,” the Gospel of Matthew recounts Jesus as saying in his most famous sermon, “for they will be shown mercy.”

joe rigney era having none of it. The prominent evangelical Christian pastor, commentator and seminary professor saw in Budde’s words a sign of “feminist cancer” invading the church, and said her call for mercy stands in the way of criminals getting what they deserve.

“When it comes to upholding strict standards of justice, empathy is a liability, not an asset,” Rigney escribió in a column for World Opinions, an evangelical publication, not long after the prayer service.

Christian leaders have long disagreed about how the Bible’s values apply to public policy. In the case of Budde’s sermon, however, the values themselves are up for debate. The idea that empathy and mercy are sins has gained traction, particularly among fans of Trump and supporters of Doug Wilson, a controversial evangelical Idaho pastor and publisher.

Your tax-deductible gift helps our journalists report the truth and hold Christian leaders and organizations accountable. Give a gift of $50 or more to The Roys Report this month, and you can elect to receive a copy of “Safe Church: How to Guard Against Sexism and Abuse in Christian Communities’ by Dr. Andrew Bauman, haga clic aquí.

doug wilson tucker carlson
In May 2024, Tucker Carlson hosts Doug Wilson in an interview. (Video screengrab)

Conservative commentator Allie Beth Stuckey, author of “Toxic Empathy: How Progressives Exploit Christian Compassion,” claims that empathy is used by liberals to mislead Christians. Rigney, whose book “The Sin of Empathy: Compassion and Its Counterfeits” is due out later this year, sees empathy as a sign that “wokeness” has infiltrated the church.

In an interview with media, Rigney said Budde’s sermon showed why women should not be allowed to speak in church services. He argued that the Bible commands its readers to withhold mercy or pity when grave sins are involved.

joe rigney
Joe Rigney (Courtesy Photo)

“The Bible obviously commands us to be tenderhearted and compassionate in various places,” he said. “And then it also says in various places that there are times when pity and compassion are entirely inappropriate.”

Rigney claimed that Budde and other liberals’ desire to show compassion and mercy for immigrants ignores instances of harm done by those in the country illegally, citing the murder of Laken Riley, a young Georgia woman killed by an immigrant. “It’s selective empathy,” he said.

He pointed to a passage in Deuteronomy that commands readers to show no pity when dealing with issues such as idolatry. Rigney said the misuse of empathy is “the main mechanism by which all things woke infiltrated the church and society.”

Franklin Graham, an evangelical leader and longtime Trump ally who also criticized Budde’s sermon, said that the new president’s actions on immigration are about enforcing the law.

“That has nothing to do with compassion,” he dicho “American Agenda,” a Newsmax program.  “It has to do with what’s right to do. If you want to have compassion, then have the law the same for everybody. Don’t have a law for one and another law for another group. No, it’s one law fits all, and we need to stay with that.”

franklin graham empathy
Franklin Graham appears on the “American Agenda” Newsmax program. (Video screengrab)

New Testament scholar Scot McKnight said Rigney misses the point about mercy and compassion in the Bible. God cares about justice, McKnight said, but God also shows compassion. McKnight pointed to a passage from the Gospel of Matthew, showing how Jesus responded when faced with human suffering.

“When he saw the crowds,” Matthew writes, “he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd.”

scot mcknight
Scot McKnight (Courtesy Photo)

McKnight suspects that Rigney and those who agree with his views believe some people are undeserving of God’s mercy, but said that mercy as it is presented in the Bible seeks to restore those who have done wrong and seeks to redeem them.

“Their biggest fear is that people are going to be too empathetic and therefore they’re not going to hold the line on righteousness,” he said. “They made a mockery of the gospel of grace and the gospel of compassion. They end up denying the very thing that Jesus was doing.”

The ongoing war on “wokeness” and social justice that has divided congregations and communities, turning issues that even conservative Christians once embraced — immigration reformrefugee resettlement and racial reconciliation — into political minefields.

PEPFAR, the global AIDS relief program that launched in 2004 as part of George W. Bush’s support for a “compassionate conservatism” and championed by megachurch leaders, seems to have lost some support. The funding for the program was paused earlier this week by the White House, then unfrozen after Secretary of State Marco Rubio emitido an emergency waiver.

Peter Wehner, a contributing writer for The Atlantic magazine and senior fellow at the Trinity Forum, said that compassionate conservativism has fallen out of favor with Republicans during the Trump years. “For many people in MAGA world, compassion is viewed as weak, hardly a virtue, and certainly not something that should be a goal of government,” he said in an email.

j.d. vance refugees
Vice President J.D. Vance speaks with “Face the Nation” host Margaret Brennan on CBS. (Video screengrab)

Trump acolytes have questioned the wisdom of funding faith groups that resettle immigrants or assist refugees. On “Face the Nation” Sunday, Vice President JD Vance despedido the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ recent championing of migrants as concern about keeping federal funding flowing more than about immigrants. World Relief, an evangelical nonprofit, and other faith-based ministries have also been criticized.

“If it can’t survive without taxpayer dollars, it’s not ministry,” escribió author and activist Megan Basham on X on Wednesday. “It’s a government agency.”

William Wolfe, a former Trump official who now runs the Center for Baptist Leadership, called refugee resettlement a grift and part of the “national suicide” of America during a discusión on X in which other speakers accused World Relief and Catholic groups of being anti-Christian and emotionally manipulative.

Groups such as World Relief gained additional access to federal funds in large part due to the “charitable choice” movement of the late 1990s and early 2000s, in which Republicans and Christian conservatives advocated for government funding for faith-based ministries.

Then-Attorney General John Ashcroft, a conservative former senator from Missouri who sponsored the original charitable choice legislation, told a White House faith-based conference in 2003: “Charitable Choice was intended to level and broaden the playing field so that secular and sacred organizations could have an equal opportunity to cooperate with government and bring the most effective programs to help feed the hungry, heal the sick, and shelter the homeless.”

brian fikkert
Brian Fikkert. (Photo courtesy Chalmers Center)

Brian Fikkert, founder of the Christian anti-poverty group Chalmers Center for Economic Development and co-author of “When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty Without Hurting the Poor … and Yourself,” said he’s baffled by claims that mercy or empathy is sinful.

“God is described as a God of both justice and compassion, and he manages to combine both,” he said. “He calls us to emulate him with deeds of justice and compassion, particularly for the poor, the oppressed, the needy, the foreigners who are in the land. Our entire predisposition ought to be an openhandedness, a compassion, a sense of mercy.”

Fikkert agrees that America should have secure borders and that government officials should be concerned with those who commit crimes, but he said that is not an excuse to treat immigrants with cruelty or scapegoat them.

Instead, the Bible, which teaches that immigrants are made in God’s image, is filled with examples of God telling leaders to be merciful. “The idea that Scripture would forbid a king or a government from being merciful or kind to the poor is just ridiculous,” he said.

Bob SmietanaBob Smietana es reportero nacional de Religion News Service.

COMPARTIR ESTE:

¡OBTÉN ACTUALIZACIONES POR CORREO ELECTRÓNICO!

¡Manténgase en contacto con Julie y reciba actualizaciones en su bandeja de entrada!

No te preocupes, no te enviaremos spam.

Más para explorar
discusión

38 Respuestas

  1. While being aware that life is full of variables, these redefinitions of ’empathy’ seem to be reactionary to the point that if embraced with little spiritual discernment, are unchristian in every sense of the word.
    Interesting to note that after interviewing and analysing numerous public servants, professionals, bussinessmen, and military personnel during the Nuremberg trials. The appointed psychologist Gustave Gilbert concluded by defining evil as, “the absence of empathy.”

  2. There are so many assumptions made here, and the title is painfully condescending … “Christianity 101”. I would dare say if you came home to see your front door unlocked, and a person moved into your spare bedroom – you would call the police. You would rightfully ask that the police remove them from your home. If that same person answered an ad to rent your bedroom, you approved them, and allowed them to move into your home, participating in your daily life within pre-agreed boundaries you would not need the law. The law would however, still manage your daily routines.

    This is no different, and is not a conversation of ‘Christian’ or ‘Christianity 101’. This is actually a PhD course in Christianity. Demonstrating love and empathy, in the middle of very complex topics, critical to our stewardship of a nation. It is applying the laws that Jesus commanded us to submit to, while also being loving during the enforcement of those laws. This requires wisdom and a daily in pouring of grace, to navigate both with honor,

    1. Nathan, a more apt analogy would be that you posted an ad needing someone to come to cook and clean your house for $10 a day, and you were happy with that arrangement for a very long time. But at some point you decided that you wanted to pay less, so you made a law that no one could come cook and clean anyone’s homes anymore, and then told your housekeeper that you’d keep them on for $5 a day, and they couldn’t say no, because you’d turn them in for breaking the law. And then you lowered it to $2 a day, and $1 a day. And then they made you mad, so you called the cops to have them arrested because they were in your house.

      This would be a more accurate analogy, if you also burned down their house so they were unsafe there, and totally dependent on you.

      A lot of people who think people being in america undocumented is an injustice to US haven’t looked at american history with immigration, which people are migrating and why, and never seem to be concerned with the people/corporations who EMPLOY undocumented workers, attracting people here.

Deja una respuesta

El Informe Roys busca fomentar el diálogo reflexivo y respetuoso. Con ese fin, el sitio requiere que las personas se registren antes de comenzar a comentar. Esto significa que no se permitirán comentarios anónimos. Además, se eliminarán todos los comentarios con blasfemias, insultos y/o un tono desagradable.
 
Artículos MÁS RECIENTES
Artículos MÁS populares
es_MXSpanish

Donar

Hola. Vemos que este es el tercer artículo de este mes que ha encontrado que vale la pena leer. ¡Estupendo! ¿Consideraría hacer una donación deducible de impuestos para ayudar a nuestros periodistas a continuar informando la verdad y restaurar la iglesia?

Your tax-deductible gift helps our journalists report the truth and hold Christian leaders and organizations accountable. Give a gift of $50 or more to The Roys Report this month, and you can elect to receive a copy of “Safe Church: How to Guard Against Sexism and Abuse in Christian Communities’ by Dr. Andrew Bauman.