America Will Fall Apart...and That is Okay

The opinions reflected in this OpEd are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of staff, faculty and students of The King's College.

Five days after the election, I sat in my Brooklyn apartment filtering through the previous week’s pent-up emails. After days of haphazardly wading through work, school and the onslaught of conflicting information, I found myself exhausted and behind. As I opened the third email of the day with some variation of “URGENT: TIME SENSITIVE” as the subject line, screams erupted from outside my bedroom window. 

Myriads of people climbed their fire escapes and descended their brownstone steps, flooding the streets and the skyline. A family of four clanged pots and pans. A middle-aged man carried a ‘90s style boom-box on his shoulder blasting “Another One Bites the Dust.” A woman with dreadlocks popped a bottle of champagne and offered it to various passersby on the sidewalk. 

I pulled out my smartphone to figure out what was going and saw The New York Times headline “Joe Biden Elected President of the United States.” 

I, like most of my neighbors, was desperate for something to celebrate and relieved at the news. I closed my laptop, donned my mask, and danced with strangers on the street until sunset. At the same time, relatives, friends and acquaintances posted about “Sharpie Gate” and #StopTheSteal protests. 

I consider myself a devout Christian, as do many of the angry voices on my Facebook feed. In a polarized time, with people on both sides of the aisle claiming Christianity, how do we figure out whether to dance or to protest? Is it possible to participate in the system at all, or does our eternal mission preclude us from temporal politics? 

This year especially, I grappled with these questions, ultimately finding guidance and solace in the wisdom of St. Augustine. While his political turmoil and personal distress differed from ours, his conclusions resonate through the intervening centuries. 

Christians can and should participate in political life, as long as they remember their identity as sojourners rather than citizens. We must pursue the City of God as we reside in the City of Man. 

The deepening echo chambers and widening chasms of American political life are no secret. A recent study by Pew Research Center quantified what we already know and experience: The divide between Republicans and Democrats is sharper than any other demographic difference in the country. 

More than race, religion, age, or any other identifying factor, political affiliation defines tribal lines. The divide seemed to peak in the Obama Administration, only to deepen during Donald Trump’s presidency. As of 2017, 44 percent of Democrats held an unfavorable view of Republicans and 45 percent of Republicans held an unfavorable view of Democrats. 

Americans primarily orient themselves around political identity, and American Christians often allow secular divides to eclipse their eternal mission. 

In a drastically different context, St. Augustine cautioned his readers against a similar temptation. 

Amid the Visigothic siege of Rome in 410 AD, Christians in the empire mourned the looming destruction of their cultural epicenter. For 800 years, the walls stood impenetrable. Citizens came to view the city as a staple in eternity, finding their identity and security in it. 

The siege of Rome distressed Christians, Augustine argued, because they had allowed temporal citizenship to eclipse their eternal city. 

While no Visigoths are threatening the walls of the United States, many American citizens perceive a similar existential threat. Whether the enemy is the “Marxist deep state” or a “fascist ideologue,” we all see troops threatening the city walls.

Many Americans, like the Roman Christians, implicitly assume that the land we inherited will live on forever. But, the walls of Rome did fall eventually, and so will the American experiment.

America is built of earth and stone, and whether by war, or time, or some yet unknown threat, it will eventually crumble. 

This is not meant to induce apathy, but to encourage eternally-oriented political involvement. 

As Jeremiah 29:7 says, we are to seek the welfare of the city where God has sent us into exile. Our city of exile happens to be a republic, which entails a reasonable responsibility to vote and participate in civic life. But, we must never forget that America is, in fact, a city of exile and not our home. 

The American norm of considering oneself primarily along partisan lines fundamentally conflicts with Christian teaching. Politics, at best, are means to an end. Loving God and neighbor include caring for the oppressed, the poor, and the unborn, and these missions may or may not involve political mechanisms. 

However, one thing is clear: if we look to our city of exile for identity and security, we will inevitably collapse with our walls.