It’s a terrible thing when leaders delay making important decisions.  They prefer to follow the easy path of keeping the status quo.  But kicking the can down the road brings out unintended consequences that are costlier in financial resources and human lives.

German Lutheran Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer realized that the German Christians were in automatic-pilot mode in the 1930’s and tried assiduously to issue a wake-up call.  He was a pioneer in seeing the devastation that Adolph Hitler could bring to his homeland, its civilization, its reputation, and Jews.  He became famous for the quote “only the person who cries out for the Jews may sing Gregorian chants.

Another German Lutheran pastor, Martin Niemöller, immortalized the quote “Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out – because I was not a Jew.  Then they came for me – and there was no one left to speak for me.”  Both pastors paid a heavy price for their convictions – Niemöller and Bonhoeffer were imprisoned, and the latter paid with his life. 

Isn’t it our moral obligation to defend Americans who are demonized as “white nationalists” by the Marxist woke crowds in the United States — in the same way that many fought discrimination against minority groups? The Marxist model of oppressor/oppressed is conveniently misused to attack Americans who are blameless to have been born “white.”  Don’t Christians pay homage to a God who is colorblind? Don’t civil rights laws and regulation forbid discrimination against any group? Niemöller and Bonhoeffer would have plenty to say on this issue if they were still alive. 

The German Christians were content with attending church, reciting their prayers, listening to sermons that addressed the Gospel, and embracing a mentality that encompassed the separation of church and state.  To them, the church was not a place where politics got mixed with religion.  Their myopic vision resulted in over 6M Jews killed by the Nazis in concentration camps and 40-50M casualties worldwide in World War II.  A heavy price to pay that could have been prevented if the German Christians had been energized to derail the ascension of Adolph Hitler and the Nazis to power!

It is incumbent on all religious leaders to address political issues in their sermons.  Nevertheless, I am aware of the damage that the Johnson Amendment of 1954 caused by prohibiting 501(c)(3) nonprofit organizations from supporting or opposing political organizations in the United States. I can see where this amendment would disincentivize religious leaders from having any involvement with politics to protect their tax-exempt status.  But President Trump signed the “Presidential Executive Order Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty” in 2017 that stopped the enforcement of the Johnson Amendment against churches (although not repealing the Amendment).  Despite the new day brought about by President Trump, Archbishop William E. Lori made the following comment on the 2017 amendment: “”As a general rule, it is not a good idea for churches to engage in partisan politics. I believe that, generally, that proves to be a great distraction from our central task and mission, which is to preach the Gospel. Furthermore, I think it would have a tendency to unnecessarily divide our congregations.“

For Christ’s sake, pastors and priests can stay within the parameters of these laws by educating their parishioners about political issues that impact their freedoms and liberties without endorsing a specific political campaign.  In other words, religious leaders should rely solely on education and allow informed parishioners to make their own decisions at the ballot box.  Don’t they understand that fully-informed Christians make the best voters? It’s not rocket science!

Archbishop Lori’s tunnel vision should be corrected with new prescription glasses that direct him to the words of Apostle James (Santiago) in James 2:14, 18-26:

“What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? Can that faith save him? … But someone will say, “You have faith and I have works.”  Show me your faith apart from your works, and I will show you my faith by my works.  You believe that God is one; you do well.  Even the demons believe – and shudder! Do you want to be shown, you foolish person, that faith apart from works is useless? Was not Abraham our father justified by works when he offered up his son Isaac on the altar? You see that faith was active along with his works, and faith was completed by his works; and the Scripture was fulfilled that says, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness” – and he was called a friend of God.  You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.  And in the same way was not also Rahab the prostitute justified by works when she received the messengers and sent them out by another way? For as the body apart from the spirit is dead, so also faith apart from works is dead.”

Archbishop Lori is not alone in his delusion of keeping politics away from the pulpit.  The majority of priests and bishops follow his lead.  And this mindset is deadly at a time when Catholics, Christians, and Jews are under attack during the Biden administration.

After the issuance of the Dobbs decision by the U.S. Supreme Court in the summer of 2022, churches became a target of secular mobs. Broken windows, churches set on fire, worshippers harangued at services, graffiti sprayed on wall, hammer-bashing religious statues became commonplace. But help was not to be expected from the Biden bureaucracy. Rather than criminalizing attacks on places of worship, Bishop Barry Knestout of the Diocese of Richmond called on members of Congress from Virginia in February of 2023 to publicly condemn a leaked FBI memorandum that sought to link Catholics to violent extremists. All of a sudden, the victims got turned into the victimizers!

According to the leaked FBI memo, “radical-traditional” Catholics who were interested in the Traditional Latin Mass were likely to have ties to “the far-right white nationalist movement.” This process is a continuation of former President Obama’s mindset after referring to blue-collar workers in Pennsylvania in 2011 as those who cling to their “guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment.”  It is obvious that Christians have been under attack under the Obama and the Biden administrations.  This is hard to believe after considering that Obama claims to be a Christian and Biden a Catholic — but perhaps this is illustrative of the doubletalk that most politicians are used to to get votes. 

American’s freedoms and liberties are under attack by powerful and well-funded atheistic globalist and Marxist organizations that thrive on pushing radical transgender, pro-abortion, and critical race theories to supplant our Judeo-Christian traditions.  All of these ideologies are anti-God, anti-human, and anti-civil rights. Unfortunately, the bureaucracy in the Catholic Church has a Pope Francis who reprimands and punishes prominent conservative American churchmen – like Cardinal Raymond Burke and Texas Bishop Joseph Strickland. Considering that the Pope is the CEO of the Catholic Church, there are not many priests, bishops, and cardinals who are willing to challenge his anti-Biblical views.  In fact, Pope Francis has not much use for what he calls “backward” conservatives who have replaced faith with ideology.   

Pope Francis does not realize that what he calls “faith and ideology” are the same things that Apostle James called “faith and works.”  The ideology that Pope Francis militates against is the one found in the Bible.   

I remind everyone that doing the right thing often takes guts and a willingness to go against the status quo.  But the world becomes a better place when these luminaries defy the odds and make a difference. 

When former President Reagan traveled to West Berlin in 1987, Chief of Staff Howard Baker and General Colin Powell discouraged him from including in his speech in front of the Brandenburg Gate the following famous line: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.” They advised the President that it would be extreme and unpresidential.  And yet, President Reagan went ahead and pronounced the famous line.  And the result was the falling down of the Berlin Wall in 1989 and the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991.   

So, what are American Catholics and Christians to do in the middle of a war against our religious traditions and founding documents?  

Stop attending and funding churches whose leaders have abdicated their responsibility to preach to their parishioners that the time is now to fight the Marxist insurgents who have declared war on Catholics.   

Attend churches whose leaders believe that the integration of politics and the Gospel are necessary to prevent catastrophes from happening in the future. 

Rather than offering financial support to churches who drop the ball by not addressing politics, channel your contributions to charitable organizations that support veterans, first responders, and conservatives. 

Kicking the can down the road is not a good policy – especially when the survival of America and Western Civilization are at stake!!!

Jorge E. Ponce is the author of “Examining the Past to Understand the Present” — which is currently available in hardback, paperback, and Kindle edition at Amazon.com.