Humanity has a long history of going along with destructive choices and behavior so long as the justification for it is dressed up with some God-talk.
If state or church leaders want people to accept their calls for violence, discrimination, abuse, exclusion, or exploitation, many have found that dropping a few references to what God would want or quoting a few Bible verses will do the trick quite well.
The past few years are just the latest iteration. The expressed desires aren’t all that subtle any more, but the churchy language remains a key component of selling it to the masses…or at least reassuring the people who already agree that it’s okay to think and act the way they do.
It matters less whether Jesus actually taught or modeled such views or behavior, and more that you feel like he’d be okay with it. The lip service that leaders pay to God help establish or reaffirm this feeling.
It becomes important to pull the curtain back and see what’s really there. This includes asking whether mumbled church words hold up to Jesus’ actual example.
Jeffrey A. Nelson 