FOUR DAYS AFTER the 2020 presidential election, Sojourners’ then-editor Jim Rice called biblical scholar Walter Brueggemann for his insights on that deeply polarized time, insights that are perhaps more relevant than ever. Their 15-minute phone call on Nov. 7 yielded more of the deep wisdom that Walter had shared with Sojourners since he published his first article with us in 1983. — The Editors
If we focus on love of neighbor, that might give room for progressives and conservatives to work together, because in terms of public and private work, it’s always a both-and and not an either-or.
Jim Rice: Where do you think we are and what are we doing as a culture, as a people, and as people of faith?
Walter Brueggemann: Well, we are increasingly alert to the fact that the gospel narrative is in deep contradiction to the way of American power and American money. While we can make important distinctions, the work that we have to do as Christians can’t sign on to any [political] party, even though we may be glad for one party prevailing over another. Our context is driving us back, as Christians, to basics — and the basic with which we have been entrusted is “love of neighbor.”
“Love of neighbor” has a wide and deep and huge reach and implication into all kinds of justice questions and into all kinds of policy formation. Our primary work in interpretation and witness is to insist that love of neighbor is the marker for who we are and what we are called to do. As Paul wrote to the Galatians, that love of neighbor sums up the entire law. If we focus on love of neighbor, that might give room for progressives and conservatives to work together, because in terms of public and private work, it’s always a both-and and not an either-or.
But it feels so unsettling to have so many self-proclaimed Christians who seem to have no problem voting for a man who seems to epitomize the opposite of that “love your neighbor” ethic.
The support for Trump is complex, but I think at bottom it is resentment. He is a master at mobilizing resentment. It is resentment toward liberals, toward moneyed people, toward the so-called governing class. We have to give thought to how we respond to people who are set deep in resentment. Our work in that regard has to do with generosity, with paying attention, with hearing the narrative of resentment and outflanking that narrative with generosity.
What does that say about the role the church has played in recent years?
I think we have spent much too long trying to show how Christian faith is allied with American money and American power — in illusionary ways. We are called to go below that for the hands-on work of generosity, hospitality, and forgiveness that treats people like neighbors, even though we have often not respected them or honored them as neighbors. That doesn’t mean we have to compromise any of our passion for justice, but I think we have to pay attention to who people are.
How do we find a glimmer of hope amid all that resentment?
About hope, I would respond in two ways. First, in every community you probably can spot amazing acts of generosity and reconciliation that come in small, surprising ways. Those small, surprising acts open up futures for us. So that’s one aspect of hope, the concrete daily lived reality that people do sometimes act in amazing generosity.
The other ground of hope, of course, is the promise of God. We have to regularly confess and celebrate that the world is under the promise of God, and God is indeed willing that the world, in all of its parts, shall come to well-being. We have to relish that promise; we have to reiterate it; we have to sing it; we have to dance it; and we have to act it.
Both of those ingredients of hope are elemental. We can’t escape into theology alone, but we [also] can’t escape into concrete neighborliness, as though our theology carried no freight for us. We have to work a two-track system of hope.
Are you saying there’s an important distinction between hope and optimism?
That’s exactly right. There is not great ground for optimism [laughs]. So, we have to go below that to what’s elemental to our faith.
You said that we can’t escape into theology, nor into an ethic of pragmatism or efficacy. So there’s got to be a warp and a woof between the theological reflection and the concrete actions?
It’s a great temptation for liberals to treat the theological claim very lightly and focus on “the other.” We can’t walk away from either one of those. We have to keep both of those available.
I confess that “God has no presence on earth but ours, just our hands and our feet” [based on the words of Teresa Ávila] was a prayer that meant a lot to me, especially when I was younger. Yes, God works through us, but it can become almost a negation that God actually works.
What happens then is that the church simply becomes an ethical society, without any underpinning.
What would you say is the one thing that people should keep in mind as we go forward?
Well, I suppose succinctly it is that love wins. It has to be said better than that, but it is that God’s promises will prevail. It is important for us, as much as we can, every day to be on the right side. When we sink into our fearful selves or when we act out of fear or scarcity, whether we’re liberal or conservative, [then] we wind up being on the wrong side and acting in anti-neighborly ways. So, keep in mind the long-term assurance that we have, which is that God’s promise of well-being will outflank all the stuff to the contrary. That gives us a base from which to live out a daily life of some risk and self-giving.
Sometimes our culture of cynicism and skepticism can become a denial of faith, a negating of [God’s] promise?
I think that’s right. When we act cynically, even if we do good things cynically, we contradict our own faith.
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