https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-surprising-skill-maga-christians-say-is-sinful-goog_l_69976218e4b0f4c9ebc660f6
The Surprising Skill MAGA Christians Say Is 'Sinful'
As Christian nationalism rises, some influential voices are reframing this ability as weakness, manipulation or even a threat to faith.
By Caroline Bologna
Feb 22, 2026, 07:00 AM EST
If asked to name examples of sins, most people would probably not mention “empathy.” But in recent years, attacks on empathy have moved from fringe talking points into mainstream right-wing Christian discourse.
Conservative commentator Allie Beth Stuckey released a book in 2024 titled “Toxic Empathy.” The following year brought the release of “The Sin of Empathy” by right-wing theologian Joe Rigney. Shortly thereafter, billionaire Elon Musk declared on Joe Rogan’s podcast that “the fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy.”
Empathy is typically defined as the ability to understand and share the feelings and perspectives of other people. It’s a skill that many Christians have long seen as aligning with the teachings and example of Jesus Christ.
But proponents of the “toxic empathy” critique now argue that empathy can cloud moral judgment or be manipulated to advance policies they see as unbiblical. That shifting view on empathy in this era of “MAGA Christianity” concerns many religious scholars and advocates.
“In the last several years, especially within MAGA-aligned Christian spaces, I’ve watched empathy get rebranded as weakness,” said Malynda Hale, executive director of the Christian nonprofit The New Evangelicals. “In choosing to care about the lived experiences of others ― whether they are immigrants, LGBTQ people, Black communities, anyone outside the white evangelicals’ space and ideological lane ― people are framed as being ‘too emotional,’ ‘unbiblical,’ or even ‘compromising your faith.’”
The rise of Christian nationalism has seen empathy demonized as “sinful,” “dangerous,” “weak,” and even a tool of liberal manipulation. Calls for compassion toward marginalized groups are increasingly met with defensiveness or hostility.
With the popularity of books like those mentioned above “driving this blatant move away from Christ’s message of radical love, justice and preferential treatment of the oppressed, MAGA Christians are able to sit comfortably in their bigotry as their neighbors are kidnapped and murdered in the streets,” said Bible scholar Mattie Mae Motl.
Motl believes the vilification stems in part from the fact that empathy promotes a kind of compassion that cannot be controlled or commodified by profit-driven economic systems.
“I first noticed empathy specifically demonized during the 2024 election, but it’s just a repackaging of a phrase that was popular when I was a conservative Christian: ‘love the sinner, hate the sin.’ This phrase has also been weaponized to keep Christians from being too loving,” said April Ajoy, author of “Star-Spangled Jesus: Leaving Christian Nationalism and Finding A True Faith.”
She recalled learning this framework with regard to the LGBTQ+ community.
“It gives justification to Christian parents to abandon their queer kids without feeling guilty,” Ajoy said. “It also gives other Christians permission to bully LGBTQ people and work to take their rights away in the name of ‘tough love.’ But hate wrapped in piety is still hate.”
The Role Of Empathy In Christianity
In today’s political climate ― particularly amid horrifying news surrounding immigration enforcement ― critics say the anti-empathy rhetoric represents a sharp departure from Christianity’s New Testament foundation.
“Christianity is a faith built on compassion for the other,” Motl said. “It is the heart of Christ’s message. The greatest commandment, according to Jesus, is that we ‘love our neighbor as ourselves.’ Without empathy, we are only able to love the neighbor who looks, thinks and believes like us.”
She pointed to the parable of the Good Samaritan, in which Jesus demonstrates what neighborly love looks like using the example of a Samaritan.
“Samaritans were a people group historically despised and rejected among the Jewish communities that Jesus grew up in,” Motl said. “The message is clear: you are to love and fight for your neighbor, even when they look, think or believe differently than you.”
Scripture also describes Jesus as empathetic. Motl quoted Hebrews 4:15: “For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses.”
“The Bible shows us that Christ’s work of salvation would be nothing without his divine and ultimate work of empathy,” she said. “This empathy was not neutral or passive. Instead, Christ’s empathy got him executed by the state ― not unlike Alex Pretti and Renee Nicole Good. Christ-like empathy comes at a cost, and this is not a cost that MAGA Christians are willing to pay.”
Ajoy sees the doctrine of the Incarnation as another reflection of Christianity as a “fundamentally empathetic theology.”
“In Jesus Christ, God enters into human vulnerability and suffering,” she said. “The Gospels repeatedly depict Jesus as emotionally responsive to the pain of others, most notably in John 11:35 ― ‘Jesus wept.’ Romans 12:15, which commands believers to ‘rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep,’ further underscores empathy as a normative Christian practice.”
She highlighted Jesus as a figure who stood with the outcast, not with the oppressors.
Hale recalls empathy being at the center of the Christian faith in which she was raised.
“I think specifically growing up in the Black church, that message of empathy was a core message because our understanding of Jesus’ words [was] to care for the marginalized and to understand the struggles of others,” she said. “That’s literally the foundation of what Jesus taught. And because so many outside factors in the United States affected the Black community differently, the church was always a place where you could go for that love and compassion.”
Why Empathy Has Been Demonized
“It’s so alarming to see so many MAGA Christians demonizing empathy today,” Ajoy said. “Empathy is frequently depicted as a moral liability that threatens political loyalty. If they can get their followers to believe it’s toxic to care about immigrant families being ripped apart, then it’s easier to continue cheering on the administration they claim came from God.”
She believes the far right Christian movement is targeting empathy as a defense mechanism.
“They have no excuse for supporting the inhumane treatment of our immigrant neighbors while claiming to follow a Christ who said, ‘I was a stranger and you did not welcome me ... and what you do to the least of these, you do to me,’” Ajoy explained. “So, they deflect instead.”
Calling empathy spiritually “dangerous” is a way to keep congregants tied to this MAGA Christian ideology.
“It trains regular churchgoers to keep their distance from those outside their small community,” Ajoy said. “If you never meet a trans person, it’s easier to believe all trans people are evil. Because it’s really hard to demonize someone when you’re close enough to see their humanity. And once the ‘other’ is humanized, a decent person would condemn their inhumane treatment. ‘Toxic empathy’ keeps well-meaning Christians from loving the neighbors Jesus called us to love.”
Hale echoed that white Christian nationalists generally cannot relate to the marginalized communities impacted by the current administration. So they feel more comfortable fearing and/or judging them.
“Because empathy requires you to see beyond your own experience, it forces you to acknowledge others have been hurt, reconsider your beliefs and sometimes confront the fact that your community has been on the wrong side of a lot of things,” she said. “That’s uncomfortable. And it’s also realizing that maybe they are clinging to the construct of whiteness and the protection it typically brings more than they are to a faith system.”
Empathy disrupts the MAGA movement’s clean narrative of hierarchy, identity and certainty. Rather than engage with discomfort or challenge certain beliefs and systems, it demonizes empathy.
“If a MAGA Christian witnesses something painful, like a child torn away from their parents, for example, or a woman bleeding out in a parking lot because of a change in abortive healthcare laws, they could be moved with compassion to soften their hard stance on ‘the rules’ according to the law,” said Tia Levings, a former Christian fundamentalist and author of “A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy.”
“They might vote differently, pay more attention to real outcomes or feel motivated to advocate for the weak or innocent,” she added.
People in power in extreme religions need rigid rules and static positions to maintain power and order, so they warn against the “danger” of compassion, flexibility and nuance.
“Framing empathy as a sin introduces shame and fear ― two powerful motivators and manipulations in high-control religion,” Levings said. “If a pastor or teacher can make someone afraid they’ll sin against God and go to a literal hell to burn for eternity if they allow themselves to be moved with compassion and take action to relieve someone’s pain, that person is more likely to put their blinders on and hope the pain isn’t happening.”
Thus, branding empathy as toxic serves both an ideological function and an institutional one by protecting existing power structures.
(Continued in 'Toxic Empathy? Part 2' -- Suzi)
@moonbus saidJesus said:
@Suzianne
Good article. TU from me, Suzi.
"MAGA Christian" is a contradiction. No one can serve Trump and Jesus both.
"No man can serve two masters: for either he will hate the one, and love the other; or else he will hold to the one, and despise the other. Ye cannot serve God and mammon." -- Matthew 6:24, KJV. Part of the "Sermon on the Mount."
Indeed. You cannot serve God and Trump.
The "Christian" Nationalists sure try, but they fall into the same trap. They have made their choice. Surely they hold to Donald Trump, and despise God.
This is why Charlie Kirk was criticized.
@moonbus saidNot hating Trump is serving him to those that hate him, while serving Christ has nothing at all to do with Trump. I guess if you can think you met someone high up in Christianity, your views on Jesus are well-grounded in something other than the truth.
@Suzianne
Good article. TU from me, Suzi.
"MAGA Christian" is a contradiction. No one can serve Trump and Jesus both.
@Suzianne saidOne more time, you turn the activities of others, that you cannot see or understand, into evil things by telling others what their motivations are, so you can cast them in a bad light. How luciferian of you, accuser.
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/the-surprising-skill-maga-christians-say-is-sinful-goog_l_69976218e4b0f4c9ebc660f6
The Surprising Skill MAGA Christians Say Is 'Sinful'
As Christian nationalism rises, some influential voices are reframing this ability as weakness, manipulation or even a threat to faith.
By Caroline Bologna
Feb 22, 2026, 07:00 AM EST
If ...[text shortened]... ional one by protecting existing power structures.
(Continued in 'Toxic Empathy? Part 2' -- Suzi)
@KellyJay saidYou give new meaning to 'sheep'.
One more time, you turn the activities of others, that you cannot see or understand, into evil things by telling others what their motivations are, so you can cast them in a bad light. How luciferian of you, accuser.
@KellyJay saidJesus called hypocrites hypocrites.
You maintain the title accuser/judgmental as they have always been. You do not even address the things said that set you off, you simply bring up insults.
Of course modern day Pharisees like yourself would get upset by that.
@KellyJay saidYou constantly insist that others do what you yourself do not.
More name calling, what exactly have I EVER said that you call me a Pharisees. This just more spew from you?
You call everyone bad, to distract from the things you do that would disqualify you.
What was the last thing you did for a homeless person?
Have you ever worked in what they call a 'soup kitchen'?
Have you ever participated in a food drive for St. Vincent de Paul, or any other charity organization?
Last time I did that, we purposefully went to a well-to-do neighborhood and someone called the police on us and had us kicked out of their neighborhood. Probably a 'nice' self-described Christian. Yes, I know all about modern-day Pharisees. "See me giving to the poor. Never mind that I actually gave them nothing."