“Donald?” Yes, Donald.

President Biden called him “Donald.” Joe called him “Donald” during Joe’s televised public comments yesterday evening. When referring to former President Donald Trump after the assassination attempt on Trump’s life in Pennsylvania just earlier, President Joe Biden called Trump “Donald.”

Who is Trump anyway? Authoritarian, Dictator Wanna-Be, Adulterer, Insurrectionist, Misogynist, Demagogue, Convicted Felon, Racist, Rapist, Narcissist. That’s how I know him. “Donald?” That personalized him, brings him into the circle of humanity, invites him over for dinner and creates pathways for listening and then, mutuality and peace.

 Of course that is how I am to consider Trump. As “Donald.” My Lord Jesus directs me to such a relationship, against my better judgment and will. “But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you,” Jesus tells us (Matthew 5:44). Does Jesus have to be so clear and concise about it? Is there no place, no room, no constitutional right for hatred and retaliation (on that, listen to Jesus on resisting an “evil-doer” by the non-violent resistance of the turned cheek, Matthew 5:39)? Must he be so fiercely gracious? Must Trump be “Donald” to me? I don’t know that I can do that, this. But Jesus does, and as I find myself in Jesus’s world, so do I. I will watch and listen to Jesus and if, and when, Jesus gets taken advantage of for this, is brutalized for this, loses credence and credulity for this, loses his life for this, that will happen to me too, for, with the Apostle Paul, “I am determined to know nothing but Christ, and him crucified” (I Corinthians 2:2).

 Lord, have mercy. “Donald?” Really? Did President Biden know what he was saying? Perhaps not. Or, perhaps he did, and does.