Jim Watson/AFP — Trump puts on his pious face
Before the end of 2016 there was little in Donald Trump’s life, or frequently offensive political campaign, to suggest that as president he would be hailed as God’s appointee on Earth, be beloved by born-again Christians, or compared to a biblical king.
Yet that is exactly what has happened in the three years since Trump took office, as he has surrounded himself with a God-fearing cabinet and struck up an unlikely but extremely beneficial relationship with white evangelical supporters.
It’s a relationship that, for the president, has ensured unwavering support from a key voter base and for his religious supporters, seen a conservative takeover of the courts and an assault on reproductive and LGBTQ+ rights.
“It’s incredibly troubling,” said Rachel Laser, president and CEO of Americans United, a nonpartisan organization dedicated to the separation of church and state.
“Trump is conferring unparalleled privilege on one narrow slice of religion,” Laser said. “He confers privilege in exchange for constant loyalty at the ballot box, no matter what he does.”
If you share your bed with garbage, the stink wears off on you. While that can be a two-way problem, the worst end of the brush is painting these religious folk to be as corrupt as Trump, his allies, his whole platform of bigotry and theft.
Every time a Christian defends Trump, an angel loses its lunch. https://www.northernsun.com/Christian-Defends-Trump-Bumper-Sticker-%287662%29.html
They even have a quantity discount.
How evangelicals abandoned Christianity — and became “conservatives” instead
As an evangelical pastor for many years, I saw faith in Jesus Christ gradually replaced by right-wing ideology https://www.salon.com/2021/07/17/how-evangelicals-abandoned-christianity–and-became-conservatives-instead-3/
Ex-evangelical explains why right-wing church membership is dropping as they get more political https://www.rawstory.com/evangelical-membership-plummets-republican-party/
The Christian Right Is in Decline, and It’s Taking America With It https://www.nytimes.com/2021/07/09/opinion/religious-right-america.html
Trump should fill Christians with rage. How come he doesn’t? https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/09/01/michael-gerson-evangelical-christian-maga-democracy/
“…From one perspective, the Christian embrace of populist politics is understandable. The disorienting flux of American ethical norms and the condescension of progressive elites have incited a defensive reaction among many conservative religious people — a belief that they are outsiders in their own land. They feel reviled for opposing gender ideology that seems to have arrived just yesterday, or for stating views on marriage that Barack Obama once held. They fear their values are under assault by an inexorable modernity, in the form of government, big business, media and academia.
Leaders in the Republican Party have fed, justified and exploited conservative Christians’ defensiveness in service to an aggressive, reactionary politics. This has included deadly mask and vaccine resistance, the discrediting of fair elections, baseless accusations of gay “grooming” in schools, the silencing of teaching about the United States’ history of racism, and (for some) a patently false belief that Godless conspiracies have taken hold of political institutions.
Some religious leaders have fueled the urgency of this agenda with apocalyptic rhetoric, in which the Christian church is under Neronian persecution by elites displaying Caligulan values. But the credibility of religious conservatives is undermined by the friends they have chosen to keep. Their political alignment with MAGA activists has given exposure and greater legitimacy to once-fringe ideas, including Confederate nostalgia, white nationalism, antisemitism, replacement theory and QAnon accusations of satanic child sacrifice by liberal politicians.
Surveying the transgressive malevolence of the radical right, one is forced to conclude: If this is not moral ruin, then there are no moral rules.”