On Sunday afternoon, Erika Kirk, the widow of Charlie Kirk, who was assassinated on Sept. 10, stood in front of tens of thousands of mourners in the State Farm Stadium and millions of others on TV and online, and did something breathtaking: She forgave the man who murdered her husband.
“I forgive him because it was what Christ did and is what Charlie would do,” she said. “The answer to hate is not hate. The answer we know from the gospel is love and always love. Love for our enemies and love for those who persecute us.”
The crowd cheered. Watching at home, tears came to my eyes. Erika Kirk personified what it means for a Christian to imitate Christ, and she did so in a moment of maximum stress and pain. Much of the rest of the rally was a worship service — full of Christians expressing love for the Kirk family, grief at his death and hope for eternal life in the world to come.
But not all of the rally was the same. When President Trump and Stephen Miller, his deputy chief of staff, spoke, the message was different.
Speaking of Charlie Kirk, Trump said, “He did not hate his opponents. He wanted the best for them. That’s where I disagreed with Charlie. I hate my opponent and I don’t want the best for them. I’m sorry. I am sorry, Erika.”
Miller, for his part, had his own message for his enemies. Addressing those he said were trying to “foment hatred against us,” he said, “You are nothing. You are wickedness. You are jealousy. You are envy. You are hatred.”
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The post Trump’s Malice Is Not an Instrument of God’s Plan appeared first on New York Times.
