Are you tired? Cause I’m tired. Downright exhausted. A few minutes on social media is a wild ride of vitriol. A few minutes on the news provides enough horror and sadness to leave anyone depressed for days. And all of politics leaves me feeling nauseated.

I’m not only exhausted by the overall content and tone of all of the attacks and comments, I am so deeply sad. Sad because the faith that I grew up with has been co-opted into a cult of fear, anger, and hatred. To hear someone scream, “I worship Jesus!” immediately after relentlessly attacking a senior member of our scientific and medical community, refusing to call him by his hard earned title of Doctor, spewing lies to his face, and interrupting him as he speaks. Would your Jesus treat him this way? If so, we don’t worship the same Jesus. The incongruence is jarring.

I’ve already written about Christian Nationalism, loss of personal freedoms, misinformation, and more, so I won’t repeat myself here. But as I scroll through Facebook and Twitter (yes, I said Twitter), and see people I once sat next to in the pews and went to potlucks with, now posting pictures of Jesus laying hands on Trump or reposting false (or at least misleading) information about immigration, women’s issues, and the climate, I just feel sad. It’s “Christians” who decline to address the #1 killer of children in the United States: firearm injury. It’s “Christians” who lobby their representatives to not fund public health and social services programs that would feed, clothe, and care for vulnerable populations. It’s “Christians” who want to gut the programs that have built opportunity and acceptance for a broad spectrum of people who have been overlooked for generations. How did we get here?!

The greatest irony is that the most staunchly “Christian” of them all are exactly the ones inspiring me to move further and further away from the religion of my youth. I will never forget during COVID, a colleague of mine talking about churches who continued to hold services and refuse masking. She said, “The problem I have with Christians is that they are just so damn selfish.” That indictment pierces me to this day. As a result, I have disassociated with the church. Showing up on Sunday has nothing to do with what I believe. “But that’s the point, the church is full of sinners!”, they say. The problem is when the sinners don’t feel repentant for their sin; the sinners dig their heels in with righteous indignation. The sinners care more about “correcting” others “in the name of love” (of course). And the sinners knowingly, purposefully hurt other humans…I can’t join that party.

A few weeks ago someone asked me where I attend church. I said, “Well, I’m more of a Jesus girl than a church girl”. I fully understand there are plenty of churches out there who are more ‘Jesus’ than ‘angry Christian’. I do understand that. But in this season of life, I don’t need to check a box by going to church. I’d rather spend my time reading about this guy, Jesus, and doing the things he said and did. I admire folks with strong convictions, but we (the collective “we” of the United States) have totally gone off the rails. American conservative Christianity would do well do actually follow the words of the Jesus they claim to follow and worship.

I have a sticker on my water bottle that I carry around everywhere. It says, “Kindness is free, sprinkle that shit everywhere”. Sometimes I picture Jesus saying that. I don’t know if Jesus would swear, but I wouldn’t put it past him, especially in that temple situation…that one was a doozy! Anyway, I think a lot about that charge to just be kind. It’s easier to be kind. It saves me a lot of service recovery emails at work. It saves me a lot of tears at home. And it turns out, being kind replaces a lot of anger and anxiety with happiness and peace. Sometimes, doing Jesus-things looks more like just feeding someone who is hungry, or loving on someone who is hurting…even if they don’t look or act or believe like we do. It’s really that simple.

I’ve been so tired of it all these days. And what I have found refreshing right now is just kindness. It’s free, my friends. Let’s sprinkle it wherever we go.

Disclaimer: My viewpoints are not necessarily reflective of my employer, or any local, regional or national organization that I belong to. As a matter of fact, I pretty much just speak for myself. Please keep that in mind.