I’ll be honest, I always thought the prophet Isaiah’s “woe to those who call evil good and good evil,” would play out a little more subtly in modern politics. Instead, last week gave us two explicitly straightforward examples of intentional, unjust redefinitions.
On Sept. 25, state Rep. John Gillette, a Republican from Kingman, Ariz., said earlier in the week that U.S. Rep. Pramila Jayapal, a Democrat from Washington state, should be “tried convicted and hanged.” After the Arizona Mirror reported on his comments, Gillette said he was simply referencing the “longstanding statutory penalty for treason.” But Jayapal, as the Mirror reported, was not calling for treason or a violent overthrow. Instead, she had been advocating for nonviolent resistance and protests. In a review of the entire session, the Mirror found there were “no calls to violence or advocating for overthrowing the government.”
Later in the week, Colombian President Gustavo Petro joined a pro-Palestinian protest in New York City and called for Palestinian liberation. In Spanish, he told the crowd: “I ask all the soldiers of the army of the United States not to point their guns at people. Disobey the orders of Trump. Obey the orders of humanity.” The U.S. State Department responded swiftly, revoking Petro’s visa “due to his reckless and incendiary actions.” On X, the department claimed that Petro “urged U.S. soldiers to disobey orders and incite violence.”
These examples should disturb us on multiple levels: It is dishonest to claim that a call for nonviolent protest is a call for treason. It is dishonest to claim that asking soldiers “not to point their guns at people” is inciting violence. These are also examples of far-right politicians attempting to curtail or discourage our First Amendment rights to free speech, peaceful assembly, and petitioning the government for redress of grievances.
But there is something more at play. This effort to define any resistance to authoritarianism—including, and sometimes especially nonviolent resistance—as violence itself is what Isaiah warns about. The prophet warns God's people against social injustice, and names how that injustice will be tied flatly to dishonest redefinitions.
These tactics are not new. From Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. to Palestinian activists, powerful governments have tried to redefine those committed to nonviolence as advocates or inciters of violence. Today, the government and its allies are trying to redefine transgender people as “terrorists” and legal asylum seekers as “invaders.” Writing for the Boston Review on political violence, Eric Reinhart sums it up well: “[W]hat is condemned as ‘violence’ is not what kills or inflicts harm. It is what threatens oligarchic control or challenges national mythologies upon which established order depends.”
READ MORE: Political Violence Isn't Just Theologically Wrong; It Doesn't Work
The FBI and the executive branch have engaged in a revisionism that benefits the belligerent and castigates the gentle—but they're not alone. At times, my fellow journalists and writers engage in the same practices.
After the horrific assassination of Charlie Kirk, The New York Times’ Ezra Klein lauded him as “practicing politics in exactly the right way.” Particularly, Klein praised Kirk and Turning Point USA as practitioners of open debate and persuasion.
I find this to be incoherent with Kirk’s actual practices, such as saying in 2021 that the Christian rapper Lecrae “should never be allowed to perform at another church after advocating for Raphael Warnock.” Far from a “polite but firm” disagreement, Kirk went further to impugn Lecrae’s integrity, accusing Lecrae of wanting “to be loved and accepted by the Democratic power establishment more than standing up for truth.” Kirk was not a proponent of free speech and dialogue without consequence; he regularly wielded his platform to try and silence those he disagreed with, including with lies and exaggerations.
This example mirrors the experience of plenty of LGBTQ+ Christians, Black Christians, feminist Christians, and others who—despite disagreements—attempted to extend politeness to our conservative interlocutors only to be met with vitriol. It’s why I have been baffled by Klein’s idea that liberals and leftists should show up to evangelical churches ready to debate abortion politics: Evangelical Christians—even pro-life ones—who questioned the tactic of abortion bans were summarily kicked out or shunned from those very churches. Same for those who spoke out against police brutality and racism, sex abuse crises, Islamophobia, and more.
To put it plainly, lots of people, already members of evangelical churches, tried what Klein called for, and they found themselves quickly unwelcome in those spaces. They were also targeted by smear campaigns that tried to recast their motives as stemming not from faith, but from ‘woke-ism’ (or whatever the buzzword of the moment was).
As a writer and a journalist, I find it imperative that we tell the truth. The truth, of course, should be told gently, with patience and love and hope for reconciliation, but it must nonetheless be the full truth. In a time when the powerful are lying in such an attempt as to redefine the truth, we have a responsibility to speak clearly against dishonest redefinitions.
But as a Christian, it is not enough to quietly lament the twisting of the truth. We must follow the example of the prophet Isaiah and declare, “Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter!”
As I read of the revocation of President Petro’s visa, I remembered that Jesus Christ is the prince of peace—the ground of my commitment to nonviolence. I thought about what Petro said to U.S. troops. Yes, it was a call to disobey orders. I understand why the U.S. government would be wary of that. But I also thought about what Jesus would say to U.S. troops: “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” (Matthew 5:44) and, “Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did it to me” (Matthew 25:40).
As a follower of Jesus, I am compelled to solidarity with the oppressed and to evangelize the good news of Christ.
In that spirit, I have a simple message: I ask all the soldiers of the army of the United States not to point their guns at people. Disobey the orders of Trump. Obey the orders of Jesus Christ.
The FBI and the executive branch have engaged in a revisionism that benefits the belligerent and castigates the gentle—but they're not alone.
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