Marjorie Taylor Greene's Bible must be a lot different from my version filled with compassion

Thanks to Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Loonytoonia) and other Republican thought leaders, I’ve recently learned things that weren’t included in my Catholic upbringing.

For starters, being kind to migrants is bad, and those who help migrants are likely being controlled by Satan.

In a recent interview, Greene spoke with Michael Voris of Church Militant, my go-to website for information about “spiritual warfare” and headlines like “Marjorie for Pope.” Voris brought up Catholic groups that help with refugee resettlement, complaining, in a tone that suggested someone was waving a liberal baby’s diaper under his nose, how they all say things like, “Oh, we have to love the family and all that.”

To which Greene sensibly replied: “Satan is controlling the church. The church is not doing its job, and it’s not adhering to the teachings of Christ, and it’s not adhering to what the word of God says we’re supposed to do and how we’re supposed to live.”

Jesus the rule-breaker

This was news to me. I vaguely recall the Bible portraying Jesus, the main character, as a chap who did a considerable amount of loving and caring for others, particularly the poor and downtrodden.

Greene continued: “What they’re doing by saying, ‘Oh, we have to love these people and take care of these migrants and love one another, this is loving one another.’ Yes, we are supposed to love one another, but their definition of what love one another means, means destroying our laws.”

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Again, I’m probably misremembering, but I would swear I recall Jesus being something of a rule breaker back in the day. Something about “Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites!”

Anyhoo, Greene went on to say Catholics who are nice to migrants are “pushing a globalist policy on the American people” and “perverting what our Constitution says.”

Who's paying to feed these people?

I was about crack open the Bible and figure out how I missed all this stuff, but then I heard Rep. Steve Chabot, an Ohio Republican, grilling Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas at a House Judiciary Committee hearing Thursday.

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Chabot, who is Catholic, seemed rather incensed that America is feeding the migrants who wind up detained at the border or resettled in other parts of the country.

“The people you’re shipping across the country, they’re being fed, right?” Chabot asked. “Who’s paying for all that?”

As Mayorkas tried to explain that “individuals in immigration proceedings are not entitled to the same” support benefits as U.S. citizens, Chabot kept interrupting with “We’re not feeding them?” and “But they’re not being fed? and, again, “We’re not feeding them?”

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Because the congressman is opposed to feeding migrants, I assume he is not one of the Catholics who Greene suggests is controlled by Satan. That’s certainly a relief. But I’m once again puzzled how, with all my years in the pews, I missed the deeply held Catholic principle of “Thou shalt not feed people if they ain’t from around these parts.”

Punishing the homeless

I finally flipped open the Bible, but then got distracted by a headline about a bill recently passed by the Republican-majority Tennessee legislature that will penalize people for being homeless. The bill, now awaiting the governor’s signature, makes camping on state property a crime, so a homeless person sleeping on the side of a road or under a bridge could get slapped with a misdemeanor or face a $50 fine. This comes from the same Republican lawmakers who last year proposed making the Bible the state book.

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A letter to the governor from more than 200 Tennessee faith leaders read: “Isaiah 58:7 calls us to 'provide the poor wanderer with shelter,' but no district in Tennessee currently has sufficient and accessible housing and shelter beds for those in need. Even when shelters do exist, many cannot meet the criteria for entry, so they are left with no other option but to sleep on public property while they work toward housing.”

I don’t want to start rumors, but if I’m following Marjorie Taylor Greene’s logic, it sounds like Satan is controlling those faith leaders.

Bible seems focused on being nice

When I finally got to paging through the Bible, I couldn’t find a darn thing similar to what Greene and Chabot and those Tennessee lawmakers are taking about. Just a bunch of stuff like this:

"But if anyone has the world's goods and sees his brother in need, yet closes his heart against him, how does God's love abide in him?"

"Whoever closes his ear to the cry of the poor will himself call out and not be answered."

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"A righteous man knows the rights of the poor; a wicked man does not understand such knowledge."

Then I found this thing Pope Francis said in April: “Let us respond to the challenge of migrants and refugees with kindness and humanity. Let us light fires of fraternity around which people can warm themselves, rise again and rediscover hope.”

But in the Bible, not a word about Satan controlling those who are kind to migrants. Not a word about how compassion for other humans is bad if it affects taxpayers. And nothing – and I mean nothing – about fining the homeless $50 for being homeless.

I must have an outdated copy. This one just says: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves.”

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Marjorie Taylor Greene: Catholics helping migrants are led by Satan