American Christian-hood – whatever that means – is completely corrupted by guess who. Anyone buying it or selling it does not believe in Jesus. If your theology requires you to harden your heart to see it through, it’s not Jesus’ theology.

They’re writing books about it now. Publishing sermons. Building a whole theology around the idea that empathy—the thing Jesus literally embodied—is dangerous.

“Empathy is dangerous,” says one conservative author. Another calls it “toxic” when it leads you to care about immigrants. A pastor wrote an entire book titled “The Sin of Empathy.”

Read that again. The sin of empathy.

This is what’s happening in American Christianity right now. A quiet civil war over whether feeling compassion for suffering people makes you weak, manipulated, or woke.

And if you’re young, if you’re still forming your faith, if you’re trying to figure out what it actually means to follow Jesus—you need to see this gaslighting for what it is.

What Jesus Actually Did

Jesus touched lepers when touching them made you unclean.

He ate with tax collectors when eating with them made you complicit.

He stopped a stoning when stopping it made you soft on sin.

He washed feet when washing them made you a servant.

He welcomed children when welcoming them wasted important people’s time.

He fed thousands when feeding them enabled dependency.

He wept with mourners. He noticed the widow’s offering. He saw the woman at the well. He called Zacchaeus down from the tree.

Every single one of these acts is empathy. Seeing someone else’s suffering or need or humanity and responding with compassion.

That’s the Gospel. That’s the whole thing.

The New Theology of Hardness

Now we’re being told that’s manipulation. That progressives have “weaponized” compassion to trick Christians into supporting immigration or LGBTQ+ rights or racial justice.

One author writes that empathy has been “co-opted to convince people that the progressive position is exclusively the one of kindness and morality.”

Translation: Don’t let feelings of compassion influence your politics. Don’t let seeing suffering change your mind about policy. Don’t let empathy make you question whether deporting families or denying people healthcare or ignoring poverty might be wrong.

They’re not arguing empathy is always bad. They’re arguing it’s bad when it makes you uncomfortable with cruelty.

What They’re Actually Defending

This anti-empathy movement has gained momentum alongside conservative policies on immigration, with at least 25 states introducing bills to ban social-emotional learning in schools—literally trying to stop children from being taught to understand others’ feelings.

Why? Because empathy makes certain policies hard to justify.

It’s hard to separate families at the border if you empathize with parents.

It’s hard to deny healthcare to poor people if you empathize with the sick.

It’s hard to ignore racial injustice if you empathize with those who suffer it.

It’s hard to exclude LGBTQ+ people if you empathize with their pain.

So instead of changing the policies, they’re trying to change Christianity itself. They’re building a theology that makes hardness holy and compassion suspect.

The Good Samaritan Wasn’t Worried About Being Manipulated

Jesus tells the story of a man beaten and left for dead on the road. A priest passes by. A Levite passes by. Both probably had good theological reasons. Don’t want to become ritually unclean. Don’t want to enable bad behavior. Don’t want to be manipulated by someone who might be faking.

Then comes the Samaritan—the outsider, the enemy—who sees the man and feels compassion. Not because he worked out all the theology first. Not because he made sure his empathy was properly “tethered” to correct doctrine. He saw suffering and responded.

Jesus doesn’t say “Be careful with your empathy.” He says “Go and do likewise.”

Your Faith Doesn’t Require You to Be Cruel

If your theology requires you to harden your heart to see it through, it’s not Jesus’ theology.

If your politics demand you stop feeling compassion to maintain them, they’re not compatible with the Gospel.

If your version of Christianity requires books explaining why empathy is dangerous, you’re following a different Jesus than the one in Scripture.

Anybody arguing that a spirit of empathy is a vulnerability is bad news.

The suffering of Jesus on the Cross invokes empathy. The call to help “the least of these” requires empathy. The entire arc of the Gospel—God becoming human to experience our suffering—is empathy.

Don’t Let Them Gaslight You

You’re not being manipulated when you feel compassion for immigrants. You’re being human.

You’re not being “woke” when you care about racial justice. You’re being awake.

You’re not weak when suffering moves you. You’re connected to the heart of the Gospel.

The people telling you empathy is dangerous are the same people who need you not to feel it. Because if you do, you might start asking why their policies create so much suffering. You might start questioning whether power and cruelty can really be Christian values.

They need you hard. Unmoved. Convinced that compassion is weakness.

Jesus needs you human. Feeling. Willing to be moved by what moves Him.

You get to choose which one you follow.

Empathy isn’t sin. Refusing it is.

KJS 12.25