- cross-posted to:
- nottheonion
- cross-posted to:
- nottheonion
WASHINGTON (AP) — Empathy is usually regarded as a virtue, a key to human decency and kindness. And yet, with increasing momentum, voices on the Christian right are preaching that it has become a vice.
For them, empathy is a cudgel for the left: It can manipulate caring people into accepting all manner of sins according to a conservative Christian perspective, including abortion access, LGBTQ+ rights, illegal immigration and certain views on social and racial justice.
“Empathy becomes toxic when it encourages you to affirm sin, validate lies or support destructive policies,” said Allie Beth Stuckey, author of “Toxic Empathy: How Progressives Exploit Christian Compassion.”
Stuckey, host of the popular podcast “Relatable,” is one of two evangelicals who published books within the past year making Christian arguments against some forms of empathy.
The other is Joe Rigney, a professor and pastor who wrote “The Sin of Empathy: Compassion and its Counterfeits.” It was published by Canon Press, an affiliate of Rigney’s conservative denomination, which counts Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth among its members.
These anti-empathy arguments gained traction in the early months of President Donald Trump’s second term, with his flurry of executive orders that critics denounced as lacking empathy.
As foreign aid stopped and more deportations began, Trump’s then-adviser Elon Musk told podcaster Joe Rogan: “The fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy.”
Even Vice President JD Vance, a Catholic convert, framed the idea in his own religious terms, invoking the concept of ordo amoris, or order of love. Within concentric circles of importance, he argued the immediate family comes first and the wider world last — an interpretation that then-Pope Francis rejected.
While their anti-empathy arguments have differences, Stuckey and Rigney have audiences that are firmly among Trump’s Christian base.
“Could someone use my arguments to justify callous indifference to human suffering? Of course,” Rigney said, countering that he still supports measured Christ-like compassion. “I think I’ve put enough qualifications.”
Historian Susan Lanzoni traced a century of empathy’s uses and definitions in her 2018 book “Empathy: A History.” Though it’s had its critics, she has never seen the aspirational term so derided as it is now.
It’s been particularly jarring to watch Christians take down empathy, said Lanzoni, a graduate of Harvard Divinity School.
“That’s the whole message of Jesus, right?”
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If this lot encountered Jesus here on earth today, they would deport him
They’re the same people that crucified him in the first place.
Nonsense. They would’ve just sent him to alligator auschwitz and made him eat rotten food from a bowl on the ground with his hands tied behind his back.
Pam: “it’s the same picture.”
jesus can just tell his daddy and the angels to smite them, send 7 of them.
This is insane
They are. Evangelicals are seriously so fucked in the head it’s like dealing with someone out of their mind on crack. And it runs deeeeeep.
the rapture is also thier creation too.
In the Bible they talk about how people will view the antichrist as virtuous. Jesus condemns the pharases who are the religious officials of the day, for hypocrisy. I understand when you regretfully have to disobey God’s words and want to call yourself a Christian, dispite your shame. I do not understand gleefully treating the sorjourner as an animal then chanting his name like you mean it. I call them antichrist-ians.
These jokers had like 2000 years of warning of what the antichrist would be like and still fell for it. Unreal.
I’m not religious, so this is in jest, but it’s still eerie.
Trump doesn’t tick all the boxes of the Antichrist (ex. he isn’t universally loved) but the Bible also says there will be many antichrists leading up to the Antichrist and he is certainly one of the them.
You sure bout that?
Universally loved / followed
The entire world follows his actions and words.
Anyway, there are 666 other reasons in that article that are pulled straight from the holey book.
I’m aware of his article. Pretty good one but even he concluded it doesn’t all align.
Nothing in the bible aligns.
But if there ever were one person who so closely fit, it is him.
The Pharisees were a competing group of reformers.
Jesus was a member of the Pharisaic tradition himself. His problem was that many, if not most, other Pharisees were selfish, self-centered, self-serving hypocrites. Just like the Rightist political and religious leaders of today. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
In order to justify their own bigotry, they seem to be literally abandoning the central teachings of the key teacher in Christianity.
When Jesus was asked “what is the most important part of the law”, the two part response was love . To love God wholly, and to love others as we love ourselves.
When later asked how Christians would be judged, Jesus said that we would be judged as if we had done to Jesus whatever we do to the least among us.
I don’t see how it is possible to reconcile bigotry with either of these teachings. I guess they can twist themselves into rhetorical knots and try, but it seems way easier to just decide to love everyone and leave it to God to judge us for whatever our sins may be.
Conservative Christians talking about the “sins” of others.
THEY SUPPORT A CHILD RAPIST WHO IS AN ADULTERER. 🤷♂️
Something something splinter log in eye something
The true Christian response would be that Trump will be judged in the afterlife but that they still support what he’s doing in government… which is making things harder for people with darker skin and/or who are LGBTQ+. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend” and all that.
Ask them if they would allow their preteen daughter to stay the night with Trump and you’ll see where their feelings truly lie. Many of them would! Many of them would happily traffick their child to him hoping that she might be his fourth wife and their family would benefit. A few would tell you that the accusations against him are inventions of the liberals, but those people are never mentally sound.
1 John 3:17
“If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can the love of God be in that person?”
You can’t expect them to read so far beyond John 3:16 now can you?
I don’t expect them to be able to count to 16…
They don’t read past Austin 3:16. That’s the only verse they live by I think.
most of them probably dont read it all, only listens to thier televengist pastor.
a brother or sister in need
Obviously, Jesus was referring to immediate family only. Anyone outside the sacred bloodline should be killed on sight.
In other news
- women are at fault for being raped because they wear revealing clothes
- the Good Samaritan was wrong, because that traveller was at fault for being robbed and beaten, why else was he on the road to Jericho
Fun historical fact: Adolf Hitler was not actually an atheist as is often commonly believed. He was actually opposed to atheism and tried to establish a German “Reich Church” that would teach Christianity aligned with Nazi propaganda. Sound familiar?
Hitler was brought up Catholic.
The Church never excommunicated him.
Not surprising considering the commonalities between cult leaders and fascist dictators. “Us” in group vs scapegoat “them” out group degenerates of the week, calling themselves family to distance from biological families and social support, hierarchy with an unquestionable leader on top, love me or suffer my wrath, etc. Even the way they talk from the pulpit or podium, no justification for any claims, just vibes and biases exploiting.
Matthew 23 is about these kinds of people. Recommended reading, even for fellow atheists. Keep in mind that the scribes and pharisees that Jesus calls out over and over again were the conservative leaders of his time - “pastors and politicians” - behaving just as ours do today.
He generally referred to them as “liars, Pharisees, hypocrites.”
As a Christian, I’m utterly disgusted by how these people are perverting my religion that’s supposed to be all about love for others. For your enemy, even.
Feed the poor, shelter the homeless, heal the sick, visit the imprisoned and welcome the foreigner. That’s how we will be judged, according to Matthew 25.
The pervert the words of Jesus. First the Prosperity Gospel, and now this.
What does your religion say should be done with these usurpers and blasphemers?
Love them? But also counter their false teachings. Loving the people they mislead or hurt, and save them from harm.
“Love the sinner, hate the sin” is the boilerplate answer, and fundamentally it’s correct, but also never forget that Jesus himself kicked over tables and brandished a whip at these people.
Like, you always think of Jesus as this soft-spoken, kind-hearted individual who always tried to help people. But when he came back to the temple and saw people were using it to try to peddle their wares under the guise and protection of religion, he called that out and threatened violence. And he was right to.
Oit of control capitalism was the one thing that made him lose his temper.
And yes, “love the sinner, hate the sin”, but also protect vulnerable people from harm, and a lot of those conservatives are explicitly looking to hurt people.
Is there a meaningful number of traditional Christians left? I haven’t seen much effort from churches to counter these false teachings.
There are a lot of Christians of many different varieties. None of the Christians I know would agree with conservative Americans.
It’s much more enticing to publish news articles about the asshats.
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If people knew S.S. Jesus was healing leppers, then there would be no incentive for people to avoid leprosy.
-Supply-Side Jesus for the uninitiated.
Conservative christian culture makes people objectively worse.
“They should have tortured Jesus even harder! I woulda fucked him up!”
-Modern Far-Right Christians
Empathy is a sin.
Exposing pedophiles is a sin.
Protecting children is a sin.
Healthcare for Gaza is a sin.
Healthcare for Americans is a sin.
Military force against the American people is God’s will.
Not sure what kinda fucked up holy war people still supporting this shit believe they’re fighting, but it’s definitely not a Christian one and you’re commiting blasphemy by claiming it is.
NPD is literally the lack of empathy and compassion. Why would we encourage people to be objectively worse people by discouraging compassion?
Well it’s fine to have compassion… for the right people!
The whole thing is framed to make it out that these people are empathetic and caring, and that trait they have is being abused by the wrong people. Refusing to empathize with those people doesn’t mean they are no longer empathetic!!
(Total BS, obviously. But that’s the loophole that they use to make this argument.)
