While the real Jesus was something of an anarchist, internationalist and even socialist, the American Jesus is more like a mascot for Western capitalism and imperialism.
The golden crown and the white skin should be giveaways that this Jesus is counterfeit. That flag by the pulpit should be all it takes to spot that a particular church is a vassal to the wealth and violent power of its own national culture, not to any universal ethic that could encompass us all.
When Jesus asked people to follow him there wasn’t an institutional church to join, nor a creed to parrot. To “follow Jesus” does not mean to join an institution, it means to share our world with those who have less and to serve the universal love for which Jesus lived and died.
As I’ve said so many times before, a kind Atheist is much closer to the example of Jesus than any religionist who teaches cruelty and superstition under the label of “Christianity.”
To “follow Jesus” does not meant to bend one’s knee to the imperialism of one’s nation nor theocratic institutions. To “follow Jesus” means to find the mustard seed of love within oneself and to let it grow into a fierce and tender justice that gives shelter to all.