There’s a peculiar kind of Christian in America today. It is one who doesn’t wear the MAGA hat, doesn’t cheer at the rallies, and doesn’t buy into every 4Chan conspiracy meme. Hell, they might even wince at the name Trump. But they have perfected something far more socially acceptable and far more dangerous: they “both sides” everything. They theologize neutrality. They sanctify silence. They drift through this historic moment whispering, Well, everyone’s bad. Politics is messy. I just want to stay focused on Jesus. And so they speak out against nothing.

Let me ask them, as bluntly as I can: What good is your faith if it has nothing to say about the world we actually live in? What good is a Christianity that refuses to name evil because doing so might be uncomfortable, socially costly, or—God forbid—political?

Here is the truth, whether we like it or not: There is no such thing as being apolitical.

Everyone lives inside a political context. Everyone participates in systems that either give them power or take it away. Politics is not something that happens “over there,” in Washington, your state capitol, or on cable news. It happens at your job, in your community, in your congregation, in the very air you breathe. You are either benefiting from the current arrangement or suffering under it. There is no neutral zone.

So, when Christians say they are “not political,” they aren’t opting out. Rather, they’re siding with the status quo. And the status quo, right now, is rife with Christian Nationalism, authoritarianism, cruelty toward marginalized communities, and a willful indifference to the suffering caused by perverts like Donald Trump.

Which brings me to the present moment.

The Epstein Files, Trump’s Conduct, and the Cowardice of Silence

We now know more about Trump’s long-documented connections to Jeffrey Epstein. We know more about the disgusting constellation of misconduct, abuse, exploitation, and violence that has followed him like a shadow for decades upon decades. We know about the fraud, the threats, the racism, the sexual assault lawsuits, the cruelty toward immigrants and the poor, and the unending stream of lies.

And yet, so many Christians—supposedly good, church-going, Jesus-loving Christians—remain silent.

They do not endorse Trump, but they do not condemn him.
They do not vote for him, but they refuse to speak out publicly against him.
They do not agree with his movement, but they cannot bring themselves to challenge their friends, their pastors, their uncles, their children.

I need them to hear this clearly:

Silence is not passive. Silence is not neutral. Silence is complicity.

In the famous Sherlock Holmes story, “The Adventure of Silver Blaze,” the detective solves the crime by noticing what didn’t happen. The watchdog failed to bark because the criminal was someone who lived in the same house. The dog recognized him, not as a threat, but as part of the family.

Y’all, that is the church today. That is the American Christian witness.

The dog hasn’t barked. Not because there’s no intruder, but because the intruder looks familiar. Because the abuser shares their politics. Because the harm-doer promises power, judges, and “religious freedom.” The silence is not incidental. It is active silence, a kind of silence that protects, that excuses, that perpetuates harm.

So let me say something that many of my own loved ones won’t want to hear but still need to:

If you remain silent while people suffer, while women and girls are abused and trafficked, while democracy erodes, while minorities are targeted, while corruption is normalized, then you are no better than those who endorse it openly. And those who endorse it openly are no better than those who commit the atrocities themselves.

If your faith cannot compel you to speak out against injustice in the clearest moral crisis of our time, then what exactly is the point? What good is a Christianity that comforts the comfortable and quiets the conscience?

Faith That Costs Nothing Is Worth Nothing

Let me end by saying this:

Jesus was not apolitical.
The prophets were not apolitical.
The early church was not apolitical.

Oppression is political.
Opposing oppression is political.
To pretend otherwise is to pretend that the Gospel is a warm bath rather than a disruptive, liberating, justice-seeking force.

The world doesn’t need more Christians who shrug. The world doesn’t need more neutrality. The world needs Christians who tell the truth, even when the truth is inconvenient.

If you believe in human dignity, speak.
If you believe in justice, act.
If you believe in the Gospel, live it publicly.
Because silence is never, ever an option.

But if you do choose to remain quiet, the rest of us will hear that deafening silence for what it is: the dog that hasn’t barked. Not because you didn’t know, but because you still chose to do nothing.

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