Charlie Kirk inverted the teachings of Jesus who identified God with the poor, the dispossessed, and the oppressed.

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The recent assassination of Charlie Kirk provoked a flurry of commentary about God, faith, and politics. All of them are closely related to OpEdNews Arc of Justice Alliance (AJA) project which seeks to respond to the Republican Project 2025 initiative.

Among the more thoughtful Kirk commentaries was David Brooks New York Times column,"We Need to Think Straight About God and Politics." His essay reminded me once again how central theology remains for understanding todays world and how dangerous it is for progressives to ignore it.

But despite Brooks good intentions, his article was fundamentally flawed. He missed the Bible's class-consciousness, a theme that runs through its central narratives and prophetic voices. In doing so, he overlooked the way modern biblical scholarship interprets scripture: as a profoundly political document that consistently sides with the poor and oppressed against the wealthy and powerful. Without acknowledging this, Brooks failed to resolve the very problem he set out to explore: how God and politics relate.

Ironically, Charlie Kirk whose white Christian nationalism has been condemned by many, grasped something Brooks did not: that the Bible is not politically neutral. But Kirk twisted that insight. Rather than recognizing Gods solidarity with the marginalized, Kirk placed the divine firmly on the side of the dominant white, patriarchal class. His theology inverted the teachings of the Jewish prophet Jesus of Nazareth, who identified God with the poor, the dispossessed, and the oppressed.

In what follows, I want to clarify this point by (1) summarizing Brooks argument, (2) contrasting it with Kirks theological vision, and (3) comparing both with the insights of modern biblical scholarship, which Ill describe as "critical faith theory." My thesis is simple: without acknowledging the achievements of such theory with its implied class-consciousness, we cannot understand either the Bible's meaning or its challenge to today's politics.

Brooks Confusion

Brooks began by observing that Kirk's funeral blurred the lines between religion and politics. Speakers portrayed Kirk as a kind of martyr, invoking Jesus example of forgiveness, while Donald Trump and his allies used the occasion to unleash vengeance and hatred. Brooks admitted he was disturbed and confused: why such a volatile mix of faith and politics? Shouldnt religion stay in the private sphere, separate from political life?

To make sense of it, Brooks reached for the old notion of complementarity. Religion and politics, he suggested, are distinct but mutually supportive. Politics deals with power; religion provides the moral compass reminding us that everyone, regardless of ideology, is a sinner in need of grace. On this view, the Bible does not offer a political program. It simply sets the stage for tepid moral reflection.

In short, Brooks tried to preserve a moderate middle ground. Faith should shape moral values but not dictate political programs.

The problem is that this neat separation has little to do with the Bible itself.

Kirk's Fundamentalist Class-Consciousness

Kirk, unlike Brooks, made no such distinction. He declared openly: I want to talk about spiritual things, and in order to do that, I have to enter the political arena.

Brooks responded with incredulity, but Kirk's reasoning is clear. His fundamentalist reading of scripture led him to embrace a particular worldview that has always been political. He believed the Bible is the literal word of God, with Moses, David, Solomon, and the gospel writers transcribing divine dictation. He accepted the traditional Christian narrative codified since the fourth century that humanity is fallen through Adam and Eves sin, redeemed by Jesus sacrificial death, and destined for heaven or hell depending on baptism and personal acceptance of Christ.

This theology, which became the official religion of the Roman Empire in the fourth century, was weaponized to support conquest, colonization, and oppression. From the Crusades to the slave trade to European colonialism, Christian rulers used this story to justify domination of Muslims, Jews, Indigenous peoples, Africans, and other non-white, non-Christian populations. Christianity, in its imperial form, became the religion of empire.

Kirk, then, was not wrong to insist that spiritual talk inevitably enters politics. But he saw Christianity as legitimizing the rule of a largely white, patriarchal elite. His class-consciousness was real but inverted.

Critical Faith Theory: A Different Story

Modern biblical scholarship tells a very different story. Beginning in the late 18th and 19th centuries, historians, linguists, archaeologists, and literary critics began examining scripture using the tools of critical analysis. They discovered that the Bible is not a single book with one author, but a library of texts written and edited over centuries. These texts include myth, poetry, drama, law codes, prophecy, letters, gospels, and apocalypses. They contain conflicting theologies: some justifying empire, others resisting it.

What emerges from this scholarship is not the story of Adam's sin and Jesus death reopening heavens gates. Rather, it is the story of liberation from slavery and God's solidarity with the poor.

The central narrative begins with the Exodus, the liberation of enslaved people from Egypt. Israel's God revealed himself as a liberator entering into a covenant with the freed slaves to form a just society where widows, orphans, foreigners, and the poor would be protected. When Israels leaders violated that covenant, prophets arose to denounce them and call the nation back to justice.

Over centuries, Israel itself was conquered by empires including Assyria, Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome. Prophets promised deliverance from oppression, not heavenly rewards in a distant afterlife.

Jesus of Nazareth stood squarely in this prophetic tradition. A poor construction worker from Galilee, he proclaimed the arrival of God's kingdom, a radically new order of justice and peace. He challenged religious elites, preached solidarity with outcasts, and raised the hopes of the oppressed. Rome executed him as a rebel through crucifixion, a punishment reserved for political insurgents.

His followers, convinced he was raised from the dead, created communities that practiced what today might be called Christian communism. The Book of Acts records that first century believers shared possessions in common and distributed resources as any had need.

This was not an abstract spirituality but a concrete economic alternative. As I've pointed out elsewhere, it might be called "communism with Christian characteristics." As Luke the evangelist put it in his Book of Acts 2:44-45, "All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need." In Acts 4:32, the same author writes: "Now the whole group of those who believed were of one heart and soul, and no one claimed private ownership of any possessions, but everything they owned was held in common."

This approach to scripture often called liberation theology, describes God as having a preferential option for the poor. Far from being neutral, the Bible takes sides. It consistently identifies God with the marginalized, not the powerful.

Jesus as the Rejected One

The class-consciousness of the Bible is perhaps most powerfully expressed in the figure of Jesus himself who, remember, is considered by Christians as the fullest revelation of God.

Think about who he was: the son of an unwed teenage mother, raised by a working-class father, living under imperial occupation. As a child he was a political refugee in Egypt. As an adult he befriended prostitutes, tax collectors, and drunkards. He clashed with religious authorities and was executed as a political criminal. He was a victim of torture and capital punishment by crucifixion, a means of execution reserved for those considered dangerous to empire.

This is not the profile of someone embraced by elites. It is the life of someone MAGA nationalists like Kirk would reject as unworthy, threatening, or vermin. Yet Christians confess this despised and rejected man as the most complete revelation of God.

Jesus himself underlined his identification with the poor when he said in Matthew 25:40, "Whatever you do to the least of my brothers and sisters -- the hungry, the thirsty, the stranger, the prisoner -- you do to me." The divine is encountered not in palaces, temples, or megachurches, but among the poor and excluded.

That is the class-conscious heart of the Bible.

Why It Matters

The contrast between Brooks, Kirk, and liberation theology highlights three very different approaches to God and politics.

• Brookstends to keep religion in the realm of private morality, supplementing politics but never shaping it directly. The problem is that the Bible itself refuses to be apolitical.
• Kirk recognizes the political dimension but twists it to sanctify empire, patriarchy, and white supremacy. His theology reflects the imperial Christianity that oppressed much of the world.
• Critical faith theorybased on profound biblical scholarship insists that the Bible sides with the oppressed. Its story begins not with sin and guilt but with liberation from slavery, continues with prophetic denunciations of injustice, and culminates in Jesus solidarity with the poor.

For progressives, this matters enormously. Too often the left cedes the Bible to the right, assuming it is inherently conservative. But modern scholarship shows the opposite: the Bible is a revolutionary text. It challenges systems of exploitation and offers resources for building communities of justice, equality, and care.

Conclusion

Its clear then that the assassination of Charlie Kirk with its renewed debate about God and politics is intimately connected to the Arc of Justice Alliance. The AJA attempts to rescue the Judeo-Christian tradition from the clutches of the patriarchy, white supremacy, racism, misogyny, xenophobia, and imperialism promoted by Christian conservatives from Constantine in the 4^th century to Charlie Kirk in the 21st.

Moderates like David Brooks may remain confused, trying to maintain a polite separation between religion and politics. Kirk, by contrast, may embrace an aggressive political theology but one that aligns God with the ruling class.

However, as we have seen, the Bible itself tells a different story. Through the lens of biblical scholarship and critical faith theory, its central theme turns out to be Gods preferential option for the poor. From the Exodus to the prophets to Jesus and the early church, scripture consistently sides with the oppressed.

Progressives ignore this at their peril. To cede the Bible to the right is to abandon one of the most powerful sources of hope, resistance, and liberation in human history. If read with eyes open to its class-consciousness, the Bible remains what it has always been: not the book of empire, but the book of revolution.

Authors Website: http://mikerivageseul.wordpress.com/

Authors Bio:

Mike Rivage-Seul is a liberation theologian and former Roman Catholic priest. His undergraduate degree in philosophy was received from St. Columban's Major Seminary in Milton Massachusetts and awarded through D.C.'s Catholic University. He received his theology licentiate from the Atheneum Anselmianum and his doctorate in moral theology (magna cum laude) from the Academia Alfonsiana in Rome where Mike studied for five years. There he also played club basketball for Eurosport and a team within Rome's Stella Azzurra professional organization. In 1972 he served for a year as coordinator of volunteers in Monsignor Ralph Beiting's Christian Appalachian Project. Then for 40 years, Mike taught theology and general studies at Berea College in Kentucky receiving its Seabury Award for excellence in teaching, Berea's highest faculty award. At Berea, Mike founded its Peace and Social Justice Studies program. He and his wife, Peggy, also organized and started the Berea Interfaith Taskforce for Peace. For years, he periodically taught liberation theology in a Latin American Studies Program in Costa Rica sponsored by the Council for Christian Colleges and Universities. In Costa Rica Mike and Peggy were fellows at the liberation theology research institute, the Departamento Ecumenico de Investigaciones (DEI) headed by the great Franz Hinkelammert. In Mexico, they also served as fellows and program directors in San Miguel de Allende's Center for Global Justice. Mike's studies and teaching have brought him to countries across Europe and to Cuba (on 10 occasions), Nicaragua (12 occasions), Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Israel, India, Zimbabwe, South Africa, and Brazil where he and Peggy were associates of Paulo Freire. Mike's languages include Latin, Greek, Hebrew, French, Italian, German, Portuguese, and Spanish. For three years he was a monthly columnist at the Lexington Herald-Leader in Lexington Kentucky. He has contributed more than 400 articles to the online news source OpEdNews where he is a senior editor. He has also published in the DEI's Pasos Journal, in the National Catholic Reporter and Christianity Today. His scholarship has been cited in the New York Times. Mike has authored or edited 10 books including one of poetry and a novel based on his experiences in Cuba. His latest book is The Magic Glasses of Critical Thinking: seeing through alternative fact & fake news (Peter Lang publishers). He blogs at http://mikerivageseul.wordpress.com/ Attempting to appropriate his identity as an ordained exorcist (all Catholic priests are), Mike also reads Tarot cards. He is a lifelong golfer and Chicago Cubs fan.