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I’ve been a Republican most of my life, but when I decided to come out as such more than a decade ago, I received death threats and my family had to go into hiding. My church had over $8,000 stolen from a collection box meant to serve the needy. I lost three-quarters of my congregation. The pressure to abandon the Republican Party was immense. But I was determined.
People often ask me why I decided to register as a Republican, which is rare on Chicago’s South Side. I usually point to the culture of dependency that liberalism has imposed on my community for the past 70 years or so. I point to the fact that my community owns very little of its infrastructure. I also point to the fact that none of these liberal policies encourage independence and self-sufficiency.
But as I’ve been thinking about this issue recently, the real reason I chose Republican over Democrat when I was younger was because of a victim mentality. So many people in my community, all Democrats, have that self-defeating mindset.
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When I challenged them to do better and told them I believed they could do better, I saw in their eyes a lack of confidence in themselves. They would then blame the system or people. The strangest thing was how animated they were when they blamed others for their shortcomings and misfortunes. They showed none of that animation when it came to their own will and actions.
I’m a pastor, and after living on the South Side for about 10 years, I began to realize that what I was seeing was the work of the devil. This victim mentality that was present in so many people was not the work of God, it was the work of the devil. It’s always the devil that makes us not believe in ourselves and our abilities.
The devil first tries to convince us that we need him to survive or to succeed, and then he tries to convince us that we cannot survive without him.
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We have come to believe in the devil more than we have in ourselves, and many of us have come to believe in victimhood more than we have in our own capabilities.
If this isn’t the work of the devil, then what is it?
I know politics is politics, but the real reason I chose the Republican Party was to show my community that they are free to choose where they want to go, without being controlled by a victim mentality, and most importantly, to show my neighbors that politics is no substitute for religion or higher spirituality.
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It’s this very rejection of victimhood that attracted me to the Republican Party. The Republican Party is far from perfect. It has a weak presence in communities like mine. But what I love about the Republican Party is the freedom to affect change by leading by example. And that’s what I’ve done with my $40 million Leadership and Economic Community Center.
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I have seen the change in my neighborhood, and when my children see the construction of our community center, I tell them this is a place where they can grow up and become great people.
I tell them that this is a safe place, free of violence, where they can concentrate on their studies. This is a place where there are no gang turf wars, where they can make friends with kids from opposing gang blocks. When I tell them these things, I see the light in their eyes. And then there’s no room for the devil.
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