For years, Christians have demanded that all Muslims speak out against Muslim extremists. When will they take their own advice? Domestic terrorists – most of them Christians – have murdered far more Americans than Muslims. They have used their faith to justify vandalizing synagogues and mosques; to excuse the gunning down of Muslims, Jews, members of the LGBTQ community, abortion providers, immigrants, and people of color. Yet Christian leaders have remained relatively silent about those who have committed these tragedies.

Likewise, few Christian leaders have spoken out against Christian White Supremacists. Christian churches have remained relatively silent on the sexual abuse of children by priests and pastors. They have not spoken out against Christian pastors who abuse their privilege, abandon their principles, and preach division and hatred from the pulpit. They have stood silent as con artists under the cloak of Christianity contort passages of the Bible to condemn abortion and homosexuality. They have watched in silence as pastors and televangelists fleece the faithful in order to buy private jets and mansions. They have refused to speak up against those who preach prosperity gospel while ignoring the poor and the hungry, even condoning their punishment. They have stood silent as some Christian pastors and churches funnel money into Jewish settlements on Palestinian territory as a way of displacing an entire population.

For the most part, Christian evangelicals have only raised their voices to convert others, to demand that the US be declared a Christian nation, to condemn those who do not believe as they do.

What will it take for the churches to reassert the teachings of the one they worship? What will it take for them to speak up in unison to condemn all violence, most especially that of those who commit it in the name of Christianity? What will it take for them to aggressively root out predatory pastors and priests? What will it take for them to call out corruption within their ranks?

What will it take for them to follow the advice they give to the leaders of other religions?