On Feb. 6, I gave the keynote address at the National Prayer Breakfast in Washington. I was followed on the dais by President Trump, who made his own remarks. And made news.
The president prefaced his speech by saying, “Arthur, I don’t know if I agree with you . . . I don’t know if Arthur is going to like what I’m going to say.” He went on: “As everybody knows, my family, our great country, and your president, have been put through a terrible ordeal by some very dishonest and corrupt people.” Disparaging his critics who made reference to their religious faith — Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) had done just that the day before, as he voted for conviction in the Senate impeachment trial — the president said, “I don’t like people who use their faith as justification for doing what they know is wrong.”
Criticism of the president’s remarks swiftly ensued, noting that he wasn’t just disagreeing with my “love your enemies” message but also with Jesus’ own teachings — a somewhat nontraditional approach at the National Prayer Breakfast, to say the least. The president’s defenders pointed out that he was simply giving as good as he had gotten from his opponents.
I received my own share of criticism, largely from people who despise the president. Demonstrating that the national scourge of political contempt is utterly bipartisan, dozens of people reached out to tell me (many in obscenity-laced emails) that I had a duty to use my platform to repudiate the president utterly — to publicly express disdain for him. My failure to do so, they said, was tantamount to acquiescence.
So why didn’t I? To express contempt for anyone is itself a rejection of Jesus’ teachings. I had advocated those teachings in my speech, and I have committed my life to them. Attacking the president would also have defeated the whole purpose of giving the talk, which was to change minds, not to scratch a partisan itch. As the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. taught about the verse on which my speech was based, “If you hate your enemies, you have no way to redeem and to transform your enemies.” In other words, no one has ever been insulted into agreement — quite the contrary. The single best way to keep people you disagree with from seeing the light is to call them idiots.
Publicly insulting others simply fuels the terrible national addiction to political hate. Recovery cannot start until the destructive behavior ceases. And the nation badly needs recovery. My job at the National Prayer Breakfast was to try to help start that recovery, not to feed the addiction.
This entire experience led me to reflect on what might seem like a mundane point, but I believe it is an important one.
I spoke my mind, and the president of the United States listened to me. Then, the president spoke his mind, and I listened to him. We obviously do not see the treatment of our political foes in the same way. I think I am right; he thinks he is right. After the event, I went about my day without incident (beyond the predictable toxic bilge on social media, which is meaningless). I went home to Boston, slept well and got up to find that I still had a job at my university.
Here’s my point: Where else could all this happen but in the United States or with our classically liberal allies? Where else could there be a public disagreement between the president and a private citizen that results in nothing of consequence? China? Of course not — I’d be in jail now. Russia? I’d be looking for political asylum somewhere.
In Federalist 10, James Madison wrote, “The latent causes of faction are thus sown in the nature of man; and we see them everywhere brought into different degrees of activity, according to the different circumstances of civil society.” That is why a peaceful competition of ideas is fundamental for a free society, and why we should cherish the ability to disagree — even with the president of the United States— without fear. Unfortunately, too often these days that freedom is taken for granted, and we descend into overheated expressions of contempt.
President Trump and I gave quite different speeches at the National Prayer Breakfast, that is true. But there was one point on which we agreed completely. It was the last line in each of our speeches: “God bless America.” I know the phrase sounds like a cliche, but it isn’t to me.
I disagreed, on national television, with the most powerful person in the world. It was no problem. God bless America.
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