The Heritage Foundation's "Project 2025"

Friends, 

You have probably heard about “Project 2025,” the 900+ page blueprint for bringing about changes in the US Government that was published by the Heritage Foundation. You can read the document here, but, as I said, it is quite long. According to an explanation by Mike Wendling of the BBC, which you can find here, “The document calls for the sacking of thousands of civil servants, expanding the power of the president, dismantling the Department of Education, sweeping tax cuts, a ban on pornography, halting sales of the abortion pill, and more.” While there is some crossover between “Project 2025” and the platforms that were adopted at the recent Republican National Convention, one should note that presidential candidate Trump said this about the document on Truth Social, “I know nothing about Project 2025, … I have no idea who is behind it … I disagree with some of the things they're saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.” 

I am making that caveat because it is not my intention to write about specific partisan political positions and I apologize if it seems that I am doing so. However, the issues addressed, the argument presented, and the rhetoric in which they are given in this document are matters of justice and well-being. As a person of faith, and especially as a pastor of a church that is committed to inclusion and justice, I will spend some time over the next few weeks reflecting on some of the arguments and rhetoric that is found there. Let me say again, if you want to read the document for yourself, you can find it here. I do not pretend that I am completely free of bias or perspective on these matters. Far from it. I am addressing “Project 2025” as a person of faith who strives to be biblically informed and justice driven. 

The first section is entitled, “A Promise to America,” by Kevin Roberts. Roberts begins with “Promise #1: Restore the Family as the Centerpiece of American Life and Protect Our Children.” Upholding the family and protecting children are laudable goals across every political spectrum as far as I know, but Roberts seems to think otherwise. He argues that the next President “must make the institutions of American civil society hard targets for woke cultural warriors,” namely by deleting the terms “sexual orientation and gender identity (‘SOGI’) diversity, equity, and inclusion (‘DEI’), gender, gender equality, gender equity, gender awareness, gender-sensitive, abortion, reproductive health, reproductive rights, and any other term used to deprive Americans of their First Amendment rights out of every federal rule, agency regulation, contract, grant, regulation, and piece of legislation that exists.”  

There is a ton to unpack here, but it is clear that the original goal of "upholding the family" does not include addressing reproductive health, and “family” does not include families with same-sex parents, nor does the goal of “protecting children” apply to families whose children are struggling with their gender identity. In fact, Roberts offers a peculiar definition of “pornography,” arguing that pornography is “manifested today in the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology….” With that stipulation, think about what it means when he argues, “Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned. Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders.” That suggests that a librarian who shelves a book about a family with two moms belongs in the same category as a pedophile, child molester, or teen sex-trafficker. 

Even places where one might want to agree with Roberts, such as his warning against the pernicious influence of "Big Tech" on children, one should notice that he specifically focuses on “TikTok,” not “X,” “Instagram,” “Facebook,” or “Truth Social.” Whether the focus away from “X” or "Facebook" is due to Elon Musk's and Peter Thiel's stated support for conservative candidates or not is hard to say. The focus on TikTok clearly plays into his warnings against Chinese espionage, which he weaves hand-in-hand with Wilsonian globalism, the United Nations, the European Union, and the “decidedly anti-human” environmental extremism. 

It seems clear that Roberts is not writing to people like me. In fact, it's quite clear that I am among the problematic types he is arguing against. I am particularly appalled that he describes person who are committed to inclusion using the term “cheap grace,” which was made famous by Dietrich Bonhoeffer in a completely different context. But, again, I'm not his audience. Curiously, I find myself echoing former President Trump's words, “I disagree with some of the things they're saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.” 

To be continued ... 

 

 

Feuds and Forgiveness

 Friends, 

 

This morning, I ran across two very different kinds of essays in my daily morning reading routine. The first was from Father Richard Rohr’s daily meditation. Rohr is currently following the path of his book, Breathing Under Water: Spirituality and the Twelve Steps, exploring the twelve steps of Alcoholics Anonymous with respect to spiritual growth more generally. Today’s excerpt is about the fifth step, “Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.” Rohr argues that the difficult work of accountability and forgiveness brings liberation to both sides of a broken relationship. 

 

The second thing I read this morning was an essay entitled “Bad Blood: A Musical Feuds Reading List.” It is an unhappy collection of how musicians have feuded long before the most recent song war between Kendrick Lamar and Drake, with stories about feuds between the Beatles and the Rolling Stones, Wynton Marsalis and Miles Davis, among others. Reading about these feuds was like the antithesis of Rohr’s essay on the fifth of the twelve steps. Within these feuds, confession seems to be treated like weakness, blaming replaces accountability, and retaliation is preferred over forgiveness. 

 

I’m sure the Center for Action and Contemplation, which produces the daily mediation from Richard Rohr, and Longreads, which provided the essay on musical feuds, were unaware that their contrasting messages would lie side-by-side in my mailbox this morning. The proximity of these contrasting ways of encountering differences – to feud or to reconcile – seems to name the challenge that many of us face these days, when we have deep and meaningful differences with one another. 

 

Last Saturday’s shooting was a recent example of how, too often, Americans are prone to turn to violence as a means of addressing deep differences. So was the attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Each of these actions, condemnation-worthy in themselves, could provide moments of self-reflection, where we examine our own contributions to the rhetoric, frustrations, and intransigence that lead to violence. Instead, professional spin-doctors flood traditional media outlets with various talking points that distance one side or the other from blame, while ordinary folk flood social media to amplify those talking points. A moment that could lead to reconciliation gets woven into the contours of the feud. 

 

The Christian path is characterized by humility, confession, love of enemies, turning the other cheek, and other virtues grounded in the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Christ. The Christian community, therefore, could be a shining light for reconciliation. At the same time, the Christian path is characterized by justice, solidarity with communities that have long been oppressed, vigorous opposition to impunity among those in power, and other virtues grounded in the life, ministry, death, and resurrection of Christ. As such, the Christian community is called to stir “good trouble,” to voice concern or make demands on behalf of what is right. Sometimes the Gospel calls us to find unity among our differences; sometimes the Gospel calls us to live in holy disunity. While these paths seem different, the depth of the Christian message is that love and justice are inherently connected. 

 

I know that many of us are struggling these days to find a proper way of connecting our call to love to our call to justice. It has never been easy and there’s a reason why the Christian path is characterized as “taking up our cross to follow.” There are moments when you and I should be slower to respond with a retort and lean in to understand better; and there are moments when you and I need to interrupt systemic oppression, white Christian nationalism, sexism, and efforts to scapegoat the LGBTQIA community. Internally, we have a similar tension between being gentle with ourselves and expecting ourselves to be strong in our faith and our convictions. 

 

I don’t have easy answers for you, and I am highly suspicious of anyone who says they do. Micah calls us to do justice, love kindness, and walk with humility. That tripartite call can ground and direct us, even if the particulars are not always clear. 

 

Mark of St. Mark

Inclusivity and the Challenge of Process

 Friends, 

 

Thanks to the nomination of some of our members, I was invited to spend last week at the Chautauqua Institute as the chaplain and a guest at the Presbyterian House. The Presbyterian House is one of several faith houses at Chautauqua and the one with the absolute best location. And, apparently, they are the only house to serve all three meals a day to their guests – all of which made me very happy. The reason I say they have the best location is because the Presbyterian House is right across the sidewalk from the Amphitheater, which is the main meeting space for the institute, hosting daily worship services, plenary speakers, and lots of music. From the upper porch of the Presbyterian House I was able to listen to a jazz concert, the symphony and the marvelous choir, and some of the plenary speakers – from a wicker rocking chair with a book in hand. It was multi-tasking at its best! 

 

During that same time, the 226^th General Assembly was taking place in Salt Lake City, UT. This year’s GA meeting was a hybrid of virtual meetings for the committees at work, then in person meetings for the gathered assembly.  Apparently that went well enough to where they voted to follow the same procedure in 2026, when the GA gathers again in Milwaukee. Today, I will highlight a couple of important decisions that were made (or not made) during the meeting. Some other time I’ll introduce some of the folks who were voted into office. 

 

A significant portion of the assembled time went to “The Olympia Overture.” This was a two-part overture from the Olympia Presbytery to amend our Book of Order (the policy portion of our constitution). The first part was applied to a section entitled “Foundation of Presbyterian Policy” that currently reads, “In Christ, by the power of the Spirit, God unites persons through baptism regardless of race, ethnicity, age, sex, disability, geography, or theological conviction” (F-1.0403). The overture was to amend the language to include sexual orientation and gender identity among the categories against which the Church will not discriminate. That part of the overture passed handily with little discussion, 389-24. The content of this amended section was the basis of the second part of the Overture. 

 

The second part of the Olympia Overture brought more debate and a closer vote. It was a change to the portion of our Book of Order entitled, “The Form of Government” which addresses ordination. In particular, this part of the Overture addresses a section (G. 2.0104b) that instructs ordaining bodies – the local congregation for deacons and elders; the presbytery for ministers – with regard to what they can or cannot explore during the ordination process. The Overture was to insert the amended “principles of representation and participation” (addressed by the first part of the Overture) into this portion of guidance, to ensure that ordaining groups do not discriminate against ordination candidates on the bases of sexual orientation and gender identity. The Overture was amended slightly to include the church’s historic commitment to “freedom of conscience.” The amended overture passed, 297-130. Now, both parts of the Overture will return to each Presbytery for ratification, requiring a simple majority to take effect. 

 

I know this looks like lots of technical polity gibberish, but the approval of this Overture is a big step forward in the church’s attempt to be more inclusive. In particular, many of our non-binary and trans siblings have worked hard to see this happen. The part about instructing ordaining bodies was more controversial, partly because once upon a time the Book of Order tried to instruct ordaining bodies not to include LGBTQ candidates, and many of us found that to be intrusive on our own discernment process. So, the pushback – as far as I can tell as someone not in the meeting – seemed less about whether or not to be inclusive and more about whether or not to intrude on the discernment process of churches and presbyteries for ordination.  

 

Another Overture, that was initially passed, then reconsidered, then withdrawn, was an Overture to divest from the fossil fuel industry altogether. Instead, the General Assembly opted for a different motion, which calls for some immediate divestment, but allows for some continued engagement on behalf of the Presbyterian Committee on Mission Responsibility through Investment (MRTI). You can read a detailed report here.

 

My very distant outsider perspective: In both cases, it seems that the General Assembly is trying to be both forward-thinking and yet wise to the diverse paths that “moving forward” might take. 

 

Final thought: My favorite report from the GA was that during one period of waiting for a vote result to be tallied and reported, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian Church took to the floor of the Assembly Hall and did “The Electric Slide.” 

 

Dance on, friends,

Mark of St. Mark