Who would Jesus call an animal?
We find ourselves here again, where a man who would be president has referred to an alleged murderer as “an illegal alien animal” at a political rally. “The Democrats say, ‘Please don’t call them animals. They’re humans,’” Donald Trump elaborated. “I said, ‘No, they’re not humans, they’re not humans, they’re animals.’”
Hold it right there, Mister. We Christians learn early in Sunday school that no human being, each created by God and ensouled with a human soul, is an animal. We also learn that it is profoundly unchristian to disavow the essential humanity of any of God’s beloved children, regardless of their immigration status or criminal record. I’ve written a column like this before, back in 2018, but it seems that new blasphemy merits fresh clapback. As Christians we are called to reject the denial of anyone’s innate human dignity. The Bible tells us so.
I’m trying to think of anyone in the Gospel stories whom Jesus might call an animal. The scribes and Pharisees? In Mark’s Gospel, Jesus calls them hypocrites, but not animals. The money changers in the temple? In the Gospel of John, he calls them thieves, but not animals. The men who crucify him? In Luke’s Gospel, not only does he not call them animals, he asks God to forgive them. In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus does refer to “dogs,” a term of contempt used at the time for nonJews, in response to the Canaanite woman whose daughter is ill, but the woman’s persistence changes his mind, perhaps convincing him that God has indeed sent him not just for the chosen people, but for everyone:
“The woman came and did him homage, saying ‘Lord, help me.’
He said in reply, ‘It is not right to take the food of the children and throw it to the dogs.’
She said, ‘Please Lord, for even the dogs eat the scraps that fall from the table of their masters.’
Then Jesus said to her, ‘O woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.’ And her daughter was healed from that hour.” (Matthew 15:25-28)
Note that Jesus uses “dogs” metaphorically, unlike literal “animals.”
The Gospels document that Jesus actually goes out of his way to welcome — to embrace — the stranger, the outcast, the marginalized, the criminal, the persecuted; in short, those whom others might call animals. Then he clearly instructs us, his followers, to do the same.
I imagine Jesus would be kicked out of the above rally, where people cheer and jeer along with their presidential nominee.
Dehumanizing migrants is a plank in Trump’s platform. Some of the goals of Project 2025, which maps out his administrative plans, are to use federal troops to detain undocumented people in camps until they can be expelled, to end birthright citizenship, to curtail humanitarian refugee programs, to eliminate DACA, and to reinstitute the heinous child separation policy. I am not making this up.
Trump’s use of derogatory terms, such as “vermin” who are “poisoning the blood of our country” in reference to those he plans to “root out” and incarcerate is deliberate. He’s reviving the propaganda of Nazism on purpose as he bludgeons us with a brutal version of Christianity called Christian Nationalism. This is not what Jesus would do.
Rather than absorbing this torrent of dangerous rhetoric, we who would do what Jesus models for us must not lose heart. Believers in the Gospel message, along with all people of good will, must stand up and speak out against the promise of cruel and inhuman government policies. As the saying goes: If not us, who? If we follow Jesus, we must overcome hatred with love. We must counter fear with kindness and lies with truth. Our brothers and sisters, fellow humans of body and soul no matter their troubles, deserve no less of us.