“Too often, and in too many ways, we remain timid when we should be bold, fearful when we are called to be unafraid, and beholden to the principalities and powers when both the prophets of scripture and the prophets of today exhort us to rethink our allegiances. We have become the church of the Empire, the very thing Jesus urged both Jews and Gentiles of his own time to rise up against. We go through great theological contortions to prod the gospel into a justification for our comfort and complacency, and fail to recognize the vast spiritual pit that we dig for ourselves in the process.”