On July 23, 2025

SPECIAL PRÉCIS ON AMERICAN PARTIALITY: ‘OH, HOW WE LOVE THE WHITE, THE RICH, AND THE POWERFUL’ (AND DESPISE THE IMMIGRANT!) – (WITH VIDEO)

THEOLOGY

SCRIPTURE. “My fellow believers, do not practice your faith in our glorious Lord Jesus Christ with an attitude of partiality [toward people—show no favoritism, no prejudice, no snobbery]. For if a man comes into your meeting place wearing a gold ring and fine clothes, and a poor man in dirty clothes also comes in, and you pay special attention to the one who wears the fine clothes, and say to him, ‘You sit here in this good seat,’ and you tell the poor man, ‘You stand over there, or sit down [on the floor] by my footstool,’ have you not discriminated among yourselves, and become judges with wrong motives?” – JAMES 2:1-4, AMP

KEY TERM: “PARTIALITY.” ‘Prosópolémpsia’ [προσωπολημψίαις]: “From a root word meaning, ‘Acceptance of the face of an individual.’ That is: ‘One exhibiting favoritism as with a respecter of persons’ [station or wealth].”

NOTE: “Strong’s Greek 4382 speaks of the sin of ‘receiving the face:’ i.e., Treating people according to outward status rather than intrinsic worth before God. Scripture consistently portrays such partiality as ‘Incompatible’ with the Divine character and with authentic Christian discipleship.”

QUOTATION. “‘The great enemy of freedom is the alignment of political power with wealth.’ This Alignment destroys the Commonwealth – that is, the natural wealth of localities and the local economies of household, neighborhood, and community – and so destroys Democracy, of which the Commonwealth is the foundation and practical means.” ― WENDELL BERRY, The Art of the Commonplace: The Agrarian Essays, 2002; edited

COMMENTARY. “‘My brethren’ — The equality of Christians intimated by this name is the ground of the admonition; ‘have’— That is, ‘hold; not the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory’ — Of which glory all who believe in him partake; ‘with respect of persons’ — So as to give undue preference to any on account of their external circumstances; honour none merely for being rich, despise none merely for being poor. Remember that the relation in which the meanest of your fellow-Christians stands to Him who is the Son of God, ought to recommend them to your regard and esteem.

‘For if there come unto your assembly’ — Convened either for religious worship, or for deciding civil differences; ‘a man with a gold ring’ — Or, ‘having his fingers adorned with gold rings,’ as χρυσοδακτυλιος may be rendered. For, as the learned Albert hath observed, those who valued themselves upon the richness and luxury of their dress, were accustomed to deck their fingers with a considerable number of costly and valuable rings, frequently wearing several upon one finger. ‘And a poor man in vile’ (ρυπαρα, in sordid, or dirty) ‘raiment, and ye have respect’ — Ye show an undue regard to the former, and put a visible slight on the latter, without considering what may be the ‘Real Character’ of the one or the other.

‘Are ye not partial in yourselves — Or, as ου διεκριθητε εν εαυτοις may be rendered, ‘ye distinguish not in yourselves,’ according to the different ‘Characters’ of these two men, to which of them the most respect is due, to the poor or to the rich; but only regard their outward appearance, ‘and are become judges of evil thoughts’ — Or ‘evil-reasoning judges,’as the original words may be translated. You reason ill and so judge wrong; for fine apparel is no proof of worth in him that wears it.” – JOSEPH BENSON, Notes on the Holy Bible, 5 vols. 1811-1818; edited

II. TEACHING

Of all the critical issues facing the Nation today, arguably second only to the Epstein Affair that has overwhelmed the news cycle today, is the subject: AMERICAN IMMIGRATION POLICY AND PRACTICE. I had not originally intended to focus on this aspect of the larger idea of a Celebrity-Loving America and Church, but as God would have it, here we go.

A SHORT HISTORY. Before diving into this obviously complex territory, we need an Historical Context to best get a fix on what is going on today under President Trump. I found an excellent Summary published by the EDITORS of the respected online journal, Bloomberg Government (May 30, 2025; edited). The Title: “A Guide to Immigration Policy Changes in 2025.”

INTRODUCTION. “U.S. Immigration continues to be one of the most hotly contested issues on the Hill and in Statehouses across the country because it impacts a wide swath of communities in every corner of America. For more than a decade, high-profile members of Congress – Democrats and Republicans alike – have called for ‘Changes to Border Policy,’ but disagree on how to get there and what success looks like. As a result, progress toward Immigration Policy Change has been slow and difficult. But for government affairs professionals, tracking legislative and regulatory updates remains a critical task.”

ADRIFT. “So: ‘What is Immigration Reform?’ The term simply refers to changes or attempts to change laws related to immigrants and immigration. And while the term was in existence well before 2013 – for instance, the U.S. Commission on Immigration Reform ran from 1990 to 1997 – it gained more popularity that year when a bipartisan group of senators called ‘The Gang of Eight’ drafteda major piece of legislation that sought to reform policies around the issue. (The Bill ultimately died in the 113th Congress).

Thus we see even in our present hour an entire History of Acrimony over this nettlesome issue. Notice in the following Bulletpoints the struggle with not only a Policy Philosophy, but also with what I consider to be the very HEART OF THE REPUBLIC since its Inception in 1776.

The 1790 Naturalization Act [G. WASHINGTON] – ‘Excluded Non-White people from having eligibility to naturalize.’ NOTE: This was our FOUNDING POLICY.

1798’s Alien Friends Act [J. ADAMS] – Authorized the president to imprison or deport any so-called ‘alien’ who was deemed dangerous to the U.S., making it the first act to authorize deportation for immigrants.

The Naturalization Act of 1870 [U.S. GRANT] – Extended eligibility for naturalization to people of African nativity or descent.

The Immigration Act of 1903 – [T. ROOSEVELT] ‘Banned beggars, anarchists, and importers of prostitutes’ (and was the first U.S. law to restrict immigration based on a person’s political beliefs).

The Immigration and Nationality Act in 1952 [D.D. EISENHOWER] – After which followed several subsequent ‘Reforms,’ including the following efforts to arrive at a unified codification of America’s Immigration Policy.

The 1965 Amendment to the INA [L.B. JOHNSON] – Ended the ‘National Origins Quota System’ [1921-1965] that had disproportionately favored European immigrants and set the stage for current immigration policies that focus on the Reunification of families and the needs of the nation’s employers.

The Refugee Act of 1980 [R. REAGAN] – Adopted the United Nation’s definition of “refugees” and expanded the annual admission of refugees.

The Immigration Reform and Control Act of 1986 [R. REAGAN] – Created a path to citizenship for people who’d entered the United States without permission before 1982 but also made it illegal for employers to knowingly hire people who are undocumented.

The Immigration Act of 1990 [G.W. BUSH] – Increased the number of people who could legally immigrate to the U.S. and provided Temporary Protected Status so Asylum Seekers could stay in the U.S. until conditions in their home countries improved.

The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) Program [B. OBAMA] – Created by former President Barack Obama in 2012, which allowed certain young immigrants without status, who were brought to the United States as children, to apply for work authorization permits and protection from immediate deportation. The Trump administration ended DACA in 2017, but the Federal Courts – including the U.S. Supreme Court – have kept the program in place and the Biden administration published updated regulations in 2022.

NOTE. You will especially mark well the variable Streams of Benevolence and Repression throughout our history, related to the Presidential Administrations of each period. TODAY: Need I even have to write it, beloved?

Thus, our ‘FOULED ROOTS,’ as I have argued repeatedly in previous commentaries, were planted deep into the Spiritual and Political Soil that justified Slavery, Native American slaughter, and the violent theft of Mexico’s lands. Those ‘Prejudicial Seeds’ have now come full flower again, under the Donald Trump Regime of undeniable Racism.

‘And the Church still supports him!’ Selah.

III. IMMIGRATION POLICY TODAY

Without a reasonable doubt, Immigration ‘Reform’ [I would call it ‘Regression’] under President Trump has taken radical turns in a very short period of time at this writing, since he took office on January 20, 2025 (180 days). What follows from the same study by Bloomberg is documentation for what we are now watching on our news programs every night now.

TODAY. “U.S. Immigration Policy is governed largely by the Immigration and Nationality Act [1965]. This current U.S. policy has Two Major Aspects: The First ‘facilitates migration flows of foreign nationals into the United States’ and the Second ‘focuses on immigration enforcement and removal’ as the U.S. Congress confirms in its primer on immigration policy.

POLICY. The proposals for Immigration Reform in 2025 are related to President Donald Trump’s position on immigration and his calls for ‘Mass Deportation, Restrictions on Asylum Access, and Border Reform.’

CHANGES. ‘During his First Term, the Trump Administration enacted a series of actions that SHIFTED immigration policy.’ And when he took office again in January 2025, after campaigning to initiate ‘the largest domestic deportation operation in American history,’ he rolled out several NEW EXECUTIVE ORDERS on Immigration Policy, related to the following.

Border Policy – (detailing that the administration will ‘marshal all available resources and authorities’ to stop illegal immigration, including establishing a physical wall and deploying ‘sufficient personnel along the southern border of the United States to ensure complete operational control’).

Enhanced Vetting and Screening – including for Visa applicants and foreign nationals seeking admission to the U.S.

Birthright Citizenship (stating that this right does not automatically extend to certain persons born in the United States).

The U.S.‑Mexico-Canada Agreement – (as the order established an ‘America First Trade Policy’).

Enforcement Policies – related to illegal entry (including for those seeking asylum, as this order revoked Biden-Era executive orders).

‘Realigning’ the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program – thereby suspending immigration under this program pending formal reporting, and revoking the 2021 executive order on ‘Rebuilding and Enhancing Programs To Resettle Refugees and Planning for the Impact of Climate Change on Migration.’

IMPACT. To gauge the subsequent ‘Brutality’ that President Trump has brought to the Immigrants in America is nearly impossible to do through the printed word. Every Christian citizen has a duty to ‘Watch the Newsreels’ graphically illustrate what we have become.

But for now, I will briefly Summarize FOUR CRUELTIES that the president’s new Immigration Policies and Practices have brought to the New America of Donald Trump. They are taken from an excellent, hard-hitting essay by Quaker scholar GREG WILLIAMS, who serves as the Senior Director of Communications at the Friends Committee on National Legislation (FCNL, Feb. 24, 2025; edited).

ASYLUM SEEKERS & REFUGEES. “The Trump Administration has indefinitely suspended the U.S. refugee process and asylum system. This a cruel rejection of time-tested pathways codified in U.S. immigration law. There is virtually no way for families and children fearing persecution to seek asylum in the U.S. CBPOne, the scheduling service used by the Biden Administration for asylum appointments, shut down minutes after Trump was sworn into office.”
DEPORTATION & DETENTION. “We have already seen Raids with people being harshly detained and deported. They have swept widely, even impacting citizens, veterans, and, some reports indicate, Native Americans. In Atlanta there was an arrest right outside a church. The Trump administration is trying to scare and confuse people – its tactics lack discretion and efficacy.”
MILITARY-DRIVEN BORDER & ENFORCEMENT POLICIES. “Already, President Trump is literally sending the Army to our border communities. The U.S. government won’t make U.S. communities safer by sending paratroopers to intimidate migrants or build walls. Trump is also threatening to invoke the historically-abused Alien Enemies Act [attempted March 15, 2025, blocked by a Federal judge] which was also used to justify the United States government’s Japanese, Italian, and German internment camps in the Second World War.
FAITH IMPERATIVE TO WELCOME. “Quaker faith demands that we welcome the Sojourner. The actions of the Trump Administration violate the religious expression rights of countless faith communities. The Department of Homeland Security has already ended its ‘Sensitive Locations Policy’ which restricted arrests in certain sensitive places, including places of worship. This is a direct assault on faith institutions, especially when combined with a broader attack on funding for welcome and respite nonprofits (many of whom are faith-based) doing the vital work of responding to desperate human need.”

QUESTION. ‘Beloved, just how can all this be happening under the Watch of the American Church?’ This is the One Question that I hold up to the incandescent Light of God’s Word in the last section. Brace yourselves for Spiritual Treachery that apparently has no more limits.

IV. LAST THOUGHTS ON A HEARTLESS CHURCH

“He who oppresses or exploits the poor to get more for himself or who gives to the rich [to gain influence and favor], will only come to poverty.” – PROVERBS 22:16, AMP

America has become the increasingly Violent Opposite of what Jesus Christ commands us to do with regard to the oppressed, the fatherless, the poor, the widow, the orphan, and yes – ‘The Alien.’

The famous poem by EMMA LAZARUS written in 1883 named, “The New Colossus” [edited),written to raise money for the construction of a pedestal for the then-new Statue of Liberty, ended with this timeless CLASSIC PLEA:

“Give me your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free, the wretched refuse of your teeming shore. Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me, I lift my lamp beside the Golden Door!”

To paraphrase an iconic line from a 1939 movie everyone in the country fell in love with: “Toto, I don’t think we’re in Kansas anymore.” “Kansas” of course an allegorical reference to all that is (or was) Good and Safe and Wholesome in America back then.

An apt phrase for the America of 1939, beloved.

REALITY. Such flagrant, myopic Presumption of American Righteousness while the Jim Crow Laws were being viciously enforced throughout the South. Many Black victims were: Lynched, Shot, Burned at the stake, Castrated, Beaten with clubs, or dismembered.

‘How many of us were taught in our schools about such atrocities?’

I therefore take my admittedly Severe Conclusions about American Christianity from an excellent commentary by DICK DOWDELL, a former Army office and software engineer in a piece titled: “The Hypocrisy of MAGA Evangelicals” (Medium, April 15, 2015; edited).

Here are his MAJOR INDICTMENTS of what I shall call for now, ‘The First Church of American Cruelty.’

“Lo, I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these My brethren, ye have done it unto Me.” — JESUS OF NAZARETH, MATTHEW 25:40

OPEN. “This verse from the Gospel of Matthew is among the most searingly direct moral imperatives in the New Testament. Jesus, in speaking of Final Judgment, makes it unequivocally clear: ‘Acts of Compassion — or their Absence — toward society’s most vulnerable are Acts made toward Christ Himself.’ There is no room for misinterpretation. No theological gymnastics can obscure its plain meaning. And yet, in the Cultural-Political Reality of 2025 America, a significant faction of self-described Evangelical Christians [83-88%] — especially those aligned with the MAGA Movement — stand in stunning opposition to this Command.”

BETRAYAL. “‘Without their support, the current cruelty and destruction of Democratic Principles by the current administration would not have been possible.’ Their actions, their policies, and their rhetoric toward the poor, the immigrant, the incarcerated, the sick, and the marginalized paint a picture of a community that has turned away from Christ’s radical message of Empathy and Inclusion. These are not mere policy preferences. They are Fundamental Violations of what it means to follow Christ — or, for the Secular among us, what it means to uphold the American Social Contract.”

CRUELTY. “Donald Trump’s Presidency and the broader MAGA Movement did not invent the erosion of America’s Social Contract, but they have certainly weaponized it. ‘Public Cruelty has become a governing strategy.’ Immigrants are being vilified. Food stamps are being slashed. Healthcare is treated not as a right but as a privilege. Tax cuts for billionaires are passed while basic services for the working class are threatened. All of it is wrapped in nationalist pageantry and, perhaps most disturbingly, blessed by a vocal wing of White Evangelical Christianity.”

CELEBRATION. “‘These Evangelicals do not merely excuse Trump’s behavior — they exalt it! They describe him as “God’s instrument,” likening him to flawed Biblical kings, as if narcissism, sexual predation, and unrepentant deceit were Divine qualifications.’ And in doing so, they reveal that their allegiance lies not with the Sermon on the Mount, but with a Tribal, Zero-sum Vision of America in which ‘the least of these’ are outsiders, threats, and moochers.”

CAPITALISM. One explanation lies in the decades-long intertwining of Conservative Evangelicalism with Right-Wing Politics and Free-market Fundamentalism. Since the Reagan Era, the Christian Right has steadily absorbed a Worldview that treats government aid as morally corrosive and equates wealth with Divine Favor. This ‘Prosperity Gospel’ and its secular cousin, ‘Libertarian Individualism,’ have displaced the humility, sacrifice, and community responsibility that once defined Christian witness. In this distorted theology, Poverty is a sign of moral failure, and suffering is to be endured, not alleviated.” [NOTE: I once heard my boss in the1980s, Pat Robertson, say on The 700 Club: “Poverty is a reproach to God!”]

CONSEQUENCES. “Jesus Christ doesn’t merely offer a gentle encouragement to help the poor. It describes a FINAL JUDGMENT in which those who ignored the hungry, the naked, and the imprisoned are cast out. The words are chilling.”

CODA. Appropriately, I shall end our conversation with the ‘SEVERITY OF CHRIST’ toward the Last Days Church, and especially its Leaders.

“Then the righteous will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry and feed You, or thirsty and give You drink? When did we see You a stranger and take You in, or naked and clothe You? Or when did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ And the King will answer and say to them, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren, you did it to Me.’

Then He will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels: for I was hungry and you gave Me no food; I was thirsty and you gave Me no drink; I was a stranger and you did not take Me in, naked and you did not clothe Me, sick and in prison and you did not visit Me.’

Then they also will answer Him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to You?’ Then He will answer them, saying, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.” – MATTHEW 25:37-26, NKJV

Beloved, these are effectively among the very Last Words the Messiah will utter to the White MAGA Church of Donald John Trump, President of the United States of America, Arch Foe of the Christian Gospel, the very Prince of Babylon the Great, The Lawless One, The Man of Sin:

The Biblical Antichrist.

MEDIA

YOUTUBE: https://youtu.be/hQdpd0xORAw